Fake news in Health: evaluation of Facebook posts about toothache-related misinformation

• Grant number: 21/10893-9
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Effective date (Start): January 01, 2022
• Effective date (End): December 31, 2022
• Field of knowledge: Health Sciences - Dentistry - Social and Preventive Dentistry
• Principal Investigator: Thiago Cruvinel da Silva
• Grantee: Mateus Martins Martini
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Odontologia de Bauru (FOB). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Bauru , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Social media have become relevant living environments for the discussion of ideas and the formulation/consumption of opinions on all aspects of life, including health. Since the interactions occur openly and remain registered for an indefinite period, the social networks can provide scientific data related to the main health interests and behaviors of a specific population. In this context, the present study aims to analyze and characterize the Facebook publications about misinformation linked to toothache. Initially, the search strategy will be determined through an exploratory analysis of the main keywords and hashtags combined using Boolean descriptors to toothache in the Crowd Tangle platform. A total of 1000 publications will be collected for analysis, 500 for each language, considering as priority the most recent publications, with the highest level of interaction and authorship of profiles with the highest number of followers. Then, two independent examiners will classify the collected posts structurally (three different levels, two referring to the type of content and one about the user's profile) and sentimentally (neutral, positive, or negative). Finally, the data linked to characteristics of the profiles and the classifications will be analyzed using descriptive statistics in the SPSS 21.0 software. Also, the data referring to the body of publications will be qualitatively analyzed by the NVivo 12 Plus software, allowing the construction of inferences and interpretation of results.(AU)