Sharing articles on social media without reading makes people feel like experts: study

New York: When someone shares articles on Facebook and Twitter, it makes them feel that they are experts on a particular topic even if they haven't read the article.

This habit is dangerous for the user and their followers. "When people feel they're more knowledgeable, they're more likely to make riskier decisions," said one of the researchers. A new study at the University of Texas has found this to be a risky situation because social media users follow certain people believing they are knowledgeable.

Some people even believe they know about the topic by just glancing at the headline of the article. The research says that sharers are publicly committing to an expert identity which shapes their sense of self. This helps them to feel just as knowledgeable as their post makes them seem.

Participants of the study thought that they knew more when they were sharing articles under their own identity instead of an alias. "If people feel more knowledgeable on a topic, they also feel they maybe don't need to read or learn additional information on that topic. This miscalibrated sense of knowledge can be hard to correct," said researchers.

Findings also suggest that when social media platforms introduce ways to encourage people to read articles before sharing, it leads to positive outcomes.

Recent data from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism suggested that only 51% of consumers who visit an online news story page read the whole article. 26% of them read the article partly and the other 22% just look at the headlines or a few lines.