Critical thinking protecting Ukrainians against Russia’s disinformation campaign

Critical thinking protecting Ukrainians against Russia's disinformation campaign In disinformation campaigns, like the long-standing pro-Kremlin campaign targeted at Ukraine by the Russian government, who is most at risk of believing false information? A study led by McGill University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) found that Ukrainians who engaged in more analytic thinking were less likely to believe the pro-Kremlin disinformation, even if they were generally pro-Russia. -Ukraine makes a challenging case to test the relationship between reasoning and the ability to see through disinformation. It's a unique information space because of the high volume of disinformation attacks from Russia and its history of distrust in institutions - making it very different from the Western democracies where most studies on disinformation have been conducted,- says Aaron Erlich , an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at McGill University. While previous research in the U.S. has linked greater analytical thinking with the ability to identify falsehoods, until now it was unknown whether this would be the case in information spaces like the one in Ukraine. The study published in Political Psychology used online and face-to-face representative samples of Ukrainians. Belief in disinformation driven more by lazy thinking. The researchers found that people who rely more on quick judgments - in lieu of engaging in critical deliberation - are more likely to believe in disinformation regardless of whether it is consistent or inconsistent with their political ideology.