Bad News

7 February 2020

Why this project?
The fake news phenomenon is on the rise. Misleading information, packaged in the form of a real news item, is distributed to make money or to influence public opinion. That is why it is important to raise awareness about this and to teach people how to recognize these messages.

What does the project entail?
In the Bad News game, you play the role of the bad guy, or the fake news maker. Players are given the task of producing disruptive and credible disinformation, while at the same time reaching and influencing as many people as possible. To do that, they are provided with all methods of fake news makers, such as dubious news sites, bot networks and international connections. In this way, players experience for themselves how fake news works and how they can recognize it.

The assumption of DROG was that by "vaccinating" people by having them make fake news themselves, what they learned lasts longer

What is the contribution from and to the Creative Industry?
DROG, a group of specialists in the field of disinformation, asked design agency Gusmanson to help develop a serious game around fake news. Bas Janson van Gusmanson: “DROG wanted to apply the inoculation theory, originally from social psychology: the idea that people can be "vaccinated" against false information by exposing them to tiny bits of information. The assumption of DROG was that by "vaccinating" people by having them make fake news themselves, what they learned lasts longer. They wanted to have this assumption tested immediately by researchers from the Social Decision-Making Lab at the University of Cambridge.”

DROG, Gusmanson and PhD researcher Jon Rozenbeek from the University of Cambridge worked closely together during the development of the game. “We have defined a fairly broad target group; the game is intended for anyone who sometimes reads the news and is vulnerable to misinformation. The game had to be very accessible, understandable for everyone and suitable for a large audience. That is why we wanted to keep the interaction as simple as possible and we opted for questions with always two options. That is about the simplest interaction you can imagine. In this way there is also all the attention for the story. We also tested these demos using the "hallway testing" method, whereby we had the demos tested by random people on the street. It soon became apparent that the simple interaction worked very well. The funny thing is that we as Gusmanson have no experience at all with designing games, because we are first and foremost interaction designers. But I think that we have therefore approached the issue in a surprising way."

“The interaction was really the basis, only then did we start thinking about the name and the visual style. We decided to make the game look very loud, with bright colors. That fits with the ugly world of disinformation, of which you become a player."

The question that was central to Rozenbeek's research was: do you really become more resistant to disinformation by playing the game? “The first survey has now been published and there appears to be a significant difference: the data show a 21% decrease in how susceptible players are to deception by fake news reports, and there is no relevant difference based on age, education level or political color. During the development of the game, Jon Rozenbeek has always checked whether we applied the inoculation theory properly.”

What now?
“In the coming period we want to use the concept of the game to appeal to specific target groups. We are looking for suitable applications, for example, we are developing a modified version of the game for classrooms, where you play the game in teams. And we want to offer the game in a different form to organizations that want to "vaccinate" their employees against disinformation. "