Digital Nudges Using Emotion Regulation to Reduce Online Disinformation Sharing

Abstract

Online disinformation often provokes strong anger, driving social media users to spread it; however, few measures specifically target sharing behaviors driven by this emotion to curb the spread of disinformation. This study aimed to evaluate whether digital nudges that encourage deliberation by drawing attention to emotional information can reduce sharing driven by strong anger associated with online disinformation. We focused on emotion regulation, as a method for fostering deliberation, which is activated when individuals' attention is drawn to their current emotions. Digital nudges were designed to display emotional information about disinformation and emotion regulation messages. Among these, we found that distraction and perspective-taking nudges may encourage deliberation in anger-driven sharing. To assess their effectiveness, existing nudges mimicking platform functions were used for comparison. Participant responses were measured across four dimensions: sharing intentions, type of emotion, intensity of emotion, and authenticity. The results showed that all digital nudges significantly reduced the sharing of disinformation, with distraction nudges being the most effective. These findings suggest that digital nudges addressing emotional responses can serve as an effective intervention against the spread disinformation driven by strong anger.