Memorialization, Contested Knowledge, and the Sociopsychological Impacts of Disinformation in the Context of COVID-19

导致社会混乱、疾病和死亡的SARS-CoV-2感染和变体浪潮继续显示出科学专业知识和权威的危机，以及政策制定者及其选民对这一流行病的普遍政治化。本项目研究了虚假信息（故意传播误导性信息）、错误信息（谎言）和“信息流行病”（一种信息过多，使问题更难解决的情况）如何影响美国个人和社区哀悼死者的方式。它关注的是，在政治动荡的环境中，当COVID-19死亡事件受到各种哀悼、驳回或归咎于他人时，人们如何管理自己的社会和心理生活。该研究有助于了解错误信息的社会影响，并为公共政策应对当前的大流行和未来的公共卫生危机提供信息，这些危机会导致大规模死亡、不完全哀悼和政治化死亡。该项目还将在为期三年的研究过程中培养18名研究生和本科生的科学研究方法。虽然大多数关于公共辩论的研究都集中在文本上，如政治演讲、报纸和学术文章，但本项目探讨了在疫情背景下，哪些行为已成为哀悼经历的核心，以及哀悼者如何在家中、墓地、悲伤咨询会议、仪式、虚拟纪念活动和社交媒体帖子等场所寻求问责。在此过程中，它解决了：(1)2019冠状病毒病的错误信息如何在其演变过程中发生变化；(2)有争议的知识如何影响COVID-19受害者及其家属的哀悼过程；(3) 2019冠状病毒病哀悼者在打击错误信息的努力中如何界定和追究责任；(4)改变的埋葬、葬礼和纪念习俗如何影响哀悼。通过社交媒体分析、面对面和虚拟人种学参与以及深度访谈，该项目分析了在语言、媒体和社会关系背景下使用的主张和反诉。数据和调查结果将有助于从人类学角度理解仪式，特别是其在有争议的环境中的功效，并为长期公共卫生危机期间不完全哀悼的过程和后果提供重要见解。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The waves of infection and variants of SARS-CoV-2 causing social disruption, sickness, and death continue to reveal a crisis in scientific expertise and authority, as well as the widespread politicization of the pandemic among policymakers and their constituents. This project examines how disinformation (the intentional airing of misleading information), misinformation (falsehoods), and the “infodemic” (a condition of excessive information that makes the solution to a problem more difficult to achieve), influence how individuals and communities in the United States mourn the dead. It focuses on how people manage their social and psychological lives when COVID-19 deaths are variously mourned, dismissed, or blamed on others in a politically fractious environment. The study contributes to understanding the social impact of misinformation and informs public policy responses to both the current pandemic and future public health crises that result in mass fatality, incomplete mourning, and politicized death. The project will also train eighteen graduate and undergraduate students in scientific research methods over the course of the three-year study.While most studies of public debates focus on texts, such as political speeches, newspaper and scholarly articles, this project explores what behaviors, in the context of the pandemic, have become central to the experience of mourning, and how mourners seek accountability in homes, cemeteries, grief counseling sessions, rituals, virtual commemorations, and social media posts, among other venues. In doing so, it addresses: (1) how COVID-19 misinformation has shifted over the course of its evolution; (2) how contested knowledge has shaped the mourning process for COVID-19 victims and their families; (3) how COVID-19 mourners have defined and pursued accountability in their efforts to counter misinformation; and (4) how altered burial, funeral, and commemorative practices affect mourning. Through social media analysis, in-person and virtual ethnographic engagement, and in-depth interviews, the project analyzes claims and counterclaims in their linguistic, media, and social relational contexts of use. Data and findings will contribute to anthropological understanding of ritual, particularly its efficacy in a contested environment, as well as provide important insight into the processes and consequences of incomplete mourning during a prolonged public health crisis.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.