Social media users were found to be persuaded by misinformation and contribute to the propagation of misinformation. It is important and urgent to understand the mechanisms behind the presentation and diffusion of misinformation-containing posts in social media. However, majority of previous studies on online misinformation focused on the non-content or surface-linguistic features, which omitted the intrinsically sociological and psychological features behind the presentation of online misinformation. Based on persuasion theories, this study characterizes the usage of persuasion strategies and its influence on the propagation of misinformation-containing posts in Sina Weibo, which can help us better understand the sociological and psychological mechanism behind the presentation and diffusion of online misinformation. The findings of this study indicate that the pathos strategies are the most common acts of persuasion in misinformation-containing posts in contrast to regular posts. In addition, the type of persuasion strategies used in the misinformation-containing posts correlate with the topics, expected actions and digital elements of the posts. Furthermore, we found statistically significant effects of persuasion strategieson users’ responses to misinformation-containing posts. The findings of this study imply a complex and context-dependent mechanism behind the misinformation presentation and propagation, which shed lights on the efforts for fighting misinformation in social media.

社交媒体用户被发现被错误信息说服并助长了错误信息的传播。了解社交媒体中包含错误信息的帖子的呈现和传播背后的机制非常重要且紧迫。然而，先前关于在线错误信息的大多数研究都集中在非内容或表面语言特征上，忽略了在线错误信息呈现背后的内在社会学和心理特征。本研究基于说服理论，表征了说服策略的使用及其对新浪微博虚假信息帖子传播的影响，有助于我们更好地理解网络虚假信息呈现和传播背后的社会学和心理机制。这项研究的结果表明，与常规帖子相比，悲情策略是包含错误信息的帖子中最常见的说服行为。此外，包含错误信息的帖子中使用的说服策略类型与帖子的主题、预期行动和数字元素相关。此外，我们发现说服策略对用户对包含错误信息的帖子的反应具有统计学意义。这项研究的结果暗示了错误信息呈现和传播背后的复杂且依赖于上下文的机制，这为打击社交媒体中的错误信息的努力提供了启示。包含错误信息的帖子中使用的说服策略类型与帖子的主题、预期行动和数字元素相关。此外，我们发现说服策略对用户对包含错误信息的帖子的反应具有统计学意义。这项研究的结果暗示了错误信息呈现和传播背后的复杂且依赖于上下文的机制，这为打击社交媒体中的错误信息的努力提供了启示。包含错误信息的帖子中使用的说服策略类型与帖子的主题、预期行动和数字元素相关。此外，我们发现说服策略对用户对包含错误信息的帖子的反应具有统计学意义。这项研究的结果暗示了错误信息呈现和传播背后的复杂且依赖于上下文的机制，这揭示了在社交媒体中打击错误信息的努力。