In this age of ‘fake news’, it is crucial that children are equipped with the skills to identify unreliable information online. Our study is the first to examine whether children are influenced by the presence of inaccuracies contained in webpages when deciding which sources to trust. Forty‐eight 8‐ to 10‐year‐olds viewed three pairs of webpages, relating to the same topics, where one webpage per pair contained three obvious inaccuracies (factual, typographical, or exaggerations, according to condition). The paired webpages offered conflicting claims about two novel facts. We asked participants questions pertaining to the novel facts to assess whether they systematically selected answers from the accurate sources. Selective trust in the accurate webpage was found in the typos condition only. This study highlights the limitations of 8‐ to 10‐year‐olds in critically evaluating the accuracy of webpage content and indicates a potential focus for educational intervention.

中文翻译：

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在线认知警惕：文本不准确和儿童对网页的选择性信任。

在这个“假新闻”时代，让孩子具备在网上识别不可靠信息的技能至关重要。我们的研究是第一个检查儿童在决定信任哪些来源时是否会受到网页中包含的不准确信息的影响。48 名 8 至 10 岁的儿童查看了三对与相同主题相关的网页，其中每对网页包含三个明显的错误（事实、印刷或夸大，视情况而定）。配对的网页提供了关于两个新事实的相互矛盾的主张。我们向参与者询问与新事实有关的问题，以评估他们是否从准确来源中系统地选择了答案。仅在拼写错误的情况下才发现对准确网页的选择性信任。