Text

theses

External ETD graduate

Although exposure to conflicting health-related information has been described as a growing problem worldwide (Carpenter et al., 2016), limited research has been conducted investigating the cognitive impact of such information. In a review conducted by Fan (2014), it was suggested that individuals exert greater cognitive effort when attending to conflicting information compared to congruent information. Therefore, individuals may employ strategies that are less cognitively burdensome after encountering conflicting information as a result of the limited availability of cognitive resources (Carpenter et al., 2016; Metzger & Flanagin, 2013). Although these strategies assist in the management of resources, they can greatly narrow the scope and/or depth of information processing, which may result in a degradation of performance. This reduction in functioning may have important implications for the ways in which individuals are capable of attending to health-related information, attaining related knowledge, and making important health decisions (Carpenter et al., 2016). Therefore, the main purpose of the study presented in this thesis was to test the relationship between conflicting health-related information exposure and attentional mechanisms, indexed by the Attentional Network Test (ANT, Fan et al., 2002). We proposed three main hypotheses: 1) exposure to conflicting health-related information (CHRI) would increase response errors during the ANT compared to participants assigned to the no conflicting health-related information (N-CHRI) condition, 2) exposure to CHRI would decrease the efficiency of each of the ANT systems (i.e., alerting, orienting, and execute control) compared to the N-CHRI condition, and 3) exposure to CHRI would increase self-reported workload, indexed by the NASA Task Load Index (NASA-TLX, Hart & Staveland, 1988), after completion of the ANT. Data from 184 online participants were analyzed to investigate these hypotheses. The participants were randomly assigned to read an article containing either congruent or conflicting health-related information. Subsequently, they completed the ANT and NASA-TLX. Participants in the CHRI condition produced more errors and slower reaction times on the ANT, and reported higher levels of workload. Consistent with prior research (Nagler et al. 2019; Nagler, 2014), CHRI participants also reported greater feelings of nutritional confusion and backlash directed at nutritional recommendations and research after being exposed to the conflicting information. The results from these analyses suggest that exposure to conflicted-health related information has the potential to impact attentional mechanisms responsible for accurate and prompt responding to incoming information. While further investigation is certainly needed to better understand this relationship and the potential associated consequences, the findings presented in this thesis can serve as a valuable starting point.

ETD_11206

M.S.

Includes bibliographical references

doi:10.7282/t3-cmfr-tk96

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