Authors

Sabina Mihelj¹;  ¹ Loughborough University, UK

Discussion

Recent research on disinformation is marked by an increasing awareness of the importance of its second-order, often unintended effects. For example, several authors have cautioned against alarmist discourse about disinformation, suggesting that it may well be compounding the problem by inadvertently undermining citizens’ trust in authoritative sources of knowledge and democratic institutions, fueling cynicism or leading to disengagement from public life (Guess and Lyons, 2021; Chadwick and Stanyer, 2022). Furthermore, there is growing evidence that  counter-disinformation measures may also have a similarly detrimental effect on public trust in reliable information (Hamaleers, 2023). The unintended consequences of widespread anxieties surrounding Russian disinformation offer another good case in point. Alarmist media coverage of Russian disinformation activities in the West has reached considerably wider audiences than these activities themselves (Reid, 2019), and Russian disinformation actors themselves have used such public recognition of their activity as evidence of their success (Reid, 2024). Finally, it is feasible to suggest that the label of disinformation has become a convenient tool of blame shifting, applied to ideological or political opponents, be they domestic or foreign – following the patterns observed in the public use of labels such as ‘fake news’ and ‘populism’ (e.g. Engelhofer and Lecheler, 2019; Shchinova et al., 2024). This paper contributes to the evolving debate on second-order effects of disinformation by drawing on the preliminary insights of an exploratory investigation of audience engagement with Russian disinformation, conducted in the framework of an ongoing AHRC-funded project. The investigation will be based on a total of 12 focus groups conducted in three socio-cultural environments believed to be particularly adversely affected by the dissemination of Russian disinformation: Poland, Serbia (Europe’s most pro-Russian country), and Arab-speaking minorities in the UK. Focus group methodologies will enable access to the discursive appropriation of narratives via an approximation of naturally occurring interactive meaning-making. Following established research practices, four focus groups will be conducted in each setting, comprising 6-8 participants divided by generation and education level (two demographic variables linked with vulnerability to disinformation). The focus group protocol, which has been drafted already, includes questions about specific instances of disinformation attributed to Russia (using relevant prompts – e.g., social media posts circulating in local media) and about perceptions of (Russian) disinformation, as well as general questions about media use, information sources and trust. Research will be conducted in the languages spoken by the relevant communities, then analysed via NVivo using a combination of discourse analysis and thematic analysis.