User experience with disinformation-countering tools: usability challenges and suggestions for improvement
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Digital media has facilitated information spread and simultaneously opened a gateway for the distribution of disinformation. Websites and browser extensions have been put forth to mitigate its harm; however, there is a lack of research exploring their efficacy and user experiences. To address this gap, we conducted a usability evaluation of two websites and three browser extensions. Using a mixed methods approach, data from a heuristic evaluation and a moderated, task-based usability evaluation are analyzed in triangulation with data collected using summative evaluations. Challenges are identified to stem from users’ inability to understand results due to the presentation of information, unclear terminology, or lack of explanations. As a solution, we recommend four design principles: First is to establish credibility, second is to improve the general visual layout and design of the tools, third is to improve search capabilities, and finally, heavy importance should be given to the depth and presentation of information.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.058 | 0.124 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.009 | 0.009 |
| Open science | 0.002 | 0.003 |
| Research integrity | 0.003 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.003 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".