The Misinformation Susceptibility Test (MIST)

Fake news and its consequences are becoming more and more of an issue in today's world, as examples such as the COVID-19 pandemic and the accompanying vaccination recommendations or climate change show. The University of Cambridge has taken up this topic and formed an international research team with the participation of Prof. Dr. Stefan Stieger from the Division of Psychological Methodology. With a total of 8504 data sets, three different studies were conducted with the aim of developing a measurement methodology for susceptibility to misinformation. In the first study, an instrument with eight to 20 items was developed, the Misinformation Susceptibility Test (MIST)-20, Mist-16 or MIST-8. In the following study, researchers validated the MIST in different subgroups and in the third study, the test is used to gain new insights into theories of psychological interventions. 

The creation, application and validation of the MIST are described in detail so that the measurement instrument can be adapted and used by other researchers for their questions in the future. The publication is freely available in the journal "Behaviour Research Methods" and was funded by several research grants.

Maertens R, Götz FM, Golino HF, Roozenbeek J, Schneider CR, Kyrychenko Y et al. The Misinformation Susceptibility Test (MIST): A psychometrically validated measure of news veracity discernment. Behavior Research Methods. 2023 Jun 29. Epub 2023 Jun 29. doi: 10.3758/s13428-023-02124-2