The Disinformation Game: A Gamified-Approach to Identifying Disinformation

Disinformation has gained traction in the public consciousness thanks to its increased prevalence in the political sphere and the media. This is in part due to the recent COVID-19 pandemic, which has given rise to a number of notable examples of fake news, disinformation or misinformation. As a society we have an increasing reliance on the internet and an increasing appetite for information. This means that the ability to critically engage with information is vital when determining fact from fiction.

While there are a number of approaches to detecting or identifying disinformation online, these can often be time consuming or difficult to scale. This project aims to leverage the ideas of information inoculation, which effectively provides users with small doses of misinformation to develop 'mental antibodies' and gamification, which is the use of a game-like experience to increase engagement or reinforce positive behaviours. The project will aim to research and develop a platform for allowing users to engage and understand disinformation online.

This 3.5 year PhD studentship is funded by an EPSRC Doctoral Training Partnership and will make use of machine learning technologies (such as Natural Language Processing) to develop a greater understanding of the narratives and information online. This will be used to drive the development of a number of game-like prototypes, which will be validated across a range of user groups.

This project will offer the ability to investigate a relevant and exciting topic with the scope for real-world impact.

The project will cover a range of topics and skills, including:
Gamification
Machine learning
Data analysis
HCI and User experience
Experimental design