How deepfake plausibility, media literacy, and personal attitudes shape detection, liking, and intentions to share political deepfakes on social media
Source record
plohl-2026-political-deepfakes-plausibility· 2026 · Humanities and Social Sciences Communications
Evidence tier: B (peer-reviewed-journal) · Verification: verified-abstract (compiler confidence: medium)
Bottom line: High-plausibility political deepfakes were detected less often and liked more; higher media literacy predicted better detection, less liking and lower sharing intention; favourable attitudes to the depicted person raised liking and sharing.
Citation
Nejc Plohl, Izidor Mlakar, Letizia Aquilino, Michele Brienza, Piercosma Bisconti, Urška Smrke (2026). How deepfake plausibility, media literacy, and personal attitudes shape detection, liking, and intentions to share political deepfakes on social media. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-026-09122-7
Verification entry (identifiers, resolvers, claims with source locations): /data/citations.json#plohl-2026-political-deepfakes-plausibility
Study design
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Design | Online experiment in three countries; participants watched manipulated political videos (climate change, immigration) varying in plausibility (technical realism and fit with the speaker's known stance); outcomes: detection, liking, sharing intention |
| Modality | video, audiovisual |
| Stimuli | Political deepfake videos on climate change and immigration, high vs low plausibility |
| Participants (N) | 1124 |
| N detail | UK, Slovenia and Italy |
| Topics | human-detection, political-deepfakes, media-literacy, sharing |
Results
| Metric | Value | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Plausibility → detection | high-plausibility deepfakes less likely to be detected | no values in abstract |
| Plausibility → liking / sharing | more liking; no significant effect on sharing intention | |
| Media literacy | better detection, less liking, lower sharing intention | strong predictor across outcomes |
| Attitude toward depicted person | more positive → more liking and sharing intention | |
| Mediation | liking partially mediated detection → sharing |
Moderators
- Plausibility (technical realism, stance congruence)
- Media literacy
- Attitude toward the speaker
- Topic
Limitations
- Values not checked against full text
- Detection rates not reported in abstract
Cited in
- MR-0001: Human Detection of Deepfakes: Accuracy, Bias, Confidence, and Training
Verification
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Status | verified-abstract |
| Compiler confidence | medium |
| Checked on | 2026-10-18 |
| Via | OpenAlex abstract record for doi:10.1057/s41599-026-09122-7 |
Values on this page have not all been checked against the full text. Confirm them against the primary source before high-stakes use.