Remedies to counter the impact of misinformation are in high demand, but little is known about the neuro-cognitive consequences of untrustworthy information and how they can be mitigated. In this preregistered study, we investigated the effects of social-emotional headline contents on social judgments and brain responses and whether they can be modulated by explicit evaluations of the trustworthiness of the media source. Participants (N = 30) evaluated –and clearly discerned– the trustworthiness of news sources before they were exposed to person-related news headlines. Despite this intervention, social judgments and brain responses were dominated largely by emotional headline contents. Results suggest differential effects of source credibility might depend on headline valence. Electrophysiological indexes of fast emotional and arousal-related brain responses, as well as correlates of slow evaluative processing were enhanced for persons associated with positive headline contents from trusted sources, but not when positive headlines stemmed from distrusted sources. In contrast, negative headlines dominated fast and slow brain responses unaffected by explicit source credibility evaluations. These results provide novel insights into the brain mechanisms underlying the “success” of emotional news from untrustworthy sources, suggesting a pronounced susceptibility to negative information even from distrusted sources that is reduced for positive contents. The differential pattern of responses to misinformation in mind and brain sheds light on the cognitive mechanisms underlying the processing of misinformation and possible strategies to avoid their potentially detrimental effects.

应对错误信息影响的补救措施需求量很大，但对于不可信信息的神经认知后果以及如何减轻这些后果知之甚少。在这项预先注册的研究中，我们调查了社会情感标题内容对社会判断和大脑反应的影响，以及它们是否可以通过明确评估媒体来源的可信度来调节。参与者 ( N  = 30) 评估——并清楚地辨别——之前新闻来源的可信度他们接触到与人有关的新闻头条。尽管有这种干预，社会判断和大脑反应主要由情绪化的标题内容主导。结果表明，来源可信度的不同影响可能取决于标题效价。对于与来自可靠来源的正面标题内容相关的人，快速情绪和唤醒相关大脑反应的电生理指标以及缓慢评估处理的相关性得到增强，但当正面标题来自不信任来源时，则没有。相比之下，负面标题主导了大脑快速和缓慢的反应，不受明确的来源可信度评估的影响。这些结果为来自不可靠来源的情感新闻“成功”背后的大脑机制提供了新的见解，表明对负面信息的明显敏感性，即使来自不信任的来源，正面内容也会减少。头脑和大脑对错误信息的不同反应模式揭示了处理错误信息的认知机制以及避免其潜在有害影响的可能策略。