Sharing Unverified Information among Generation Z: The Role of Institutional Trust and Self-Efficacy
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.37535/Keywords:
Institution Trust; Share Information; Self-Efficacy; Misinformation; Social Media; Generasi ZAbstract
The widespread circulation of unverified information on social media indicates that trust in information sources does not always prevent the spread of misinformation. This condition raises questions about the role of trust in institutions and individuals’ confidence in detecting misinformation in shaping the tendency to share information on social media. This study aims to examine the direct relationships between trust in institutions on social media, perceived self-efficacy in detecting misinformation, and reasons for sharing unverified information among Generation Z in Indonesia through three explanatory hypotheses. Specifically, this study explores the role of perceived self-efficacy in detecting misinformation as a mediating mechanism in this relationship. Using a survey approach, this study involves 140 Generation Z in Indonesia who are active social media users, to understand how trust in institutions on social media influences individuals’ confidence in detecting misinformation and their reasons for sharing unverified information in online environments. The results show that trust in institutions on social media has no significant effect on reasons for sharing unverified information, whereas perceived self-efficacy in detecting misinformation has a positive and significant effect on the sharing of unverified information.
References
Altay, S., Hacquin, A. S., & Mercier, H. (2022). Why do so few people share fake news? It hurts their reputation. New Media & Society, 24(6), 1303–1324. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444820969893
Bandura, A. (1977). Self-efficacy: Toward a unifying theory of behavioral change. Psychological Review, 84(2), 191–215. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.84.2.191
Baron, R. M., & Kenny, D. A. (1986). The moderator–mediator variable distinction in social psychological research: Conceptual, strategic, and statistical considerations. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 51(6), 1173–1182. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.51.6.1173
Chambers, S. (2021). Truth, deliberative democracy, and the virtues of accuracy: Is fake news destroying the public sphere? Political Studies, 69(1), 147–163. https://doi.org/10.1177/0032321719890811
Chen, Y., Conroy, N. J., & Rubin, V. L. (2015). Misleading online content: Recognizing clickbait as "false news." In Proceedings of the 2015 ACM Workshop on Multimodal Deception Detection (pp. 15–19). Association for Computing Machinery. https://doi.org/10.1145/2823465.2823467
Di Domenico, G., Nunan, D., Sit, J., & Pitardi, V. (2021). Free but fake speech: When giving primacy to the source decreases misinformation sharing on social media. Psychology & Marketing, 38(10), 1700–1711. https://doi.org/10.1002/mar.21537
Etikan, I. (2016). Comparison of convenience sampling and purposive sampling. American Journal of Theoretical and Applied Statistics, 5(1), 1–4. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajtas.20160501.11
Fendt, M., Nistor, N., Scheibenzuber, C., & Artmann, B. (2023). Sourcing against misinformation: Effects of a scalable lateral reading training based on cognitive apprenticeship. Computers in Human Behavior, 146, 107820. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2023.107820
Hocevar, K. P., Flanagin, A. J., & Metzger, M. J. (2014). Social media self-efficacy and information evaluation online. Computers in Human Behavior, 39, 254–262. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2014.07.020
Hsieh-Yee, I. (2021). Can we trust social media? Internet Reference Services Quarterly, 25(1–2), 9–23. https://doi.org/10.1080/10875301.2021.1899593
Khan, M. L., & Idris, I. K. (2019). Recognise misinformation and verify before sharing: A reasoned action and information literacy perspective. Behaviour & Information Technology, 38(12), 1194–1212. https://doi.org/10.1080/0144929X.2019.1578828
Kruger, J., & Dunning, D. (1999). Unskilled and unaware of it: How difficulties in recognizing one's own incompetence lead to inflated self-assessments. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77(6), 1121–1134. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.77.6.1121
Metzger, M. J., Flanagin, A. J., Mena, P., Jiang, S., & Wilson, C. (2021). From dark to light: The many shades of sharing misinformation online. Media and Communication, 9(1), 134–143. https://doi.org/10.17645/mac.v9i1.3529
Pennycook, G., Epstein, Z., Mosleh, M., Arechar, A. A., Eckles, D., & Rand, D. G. (2021). Shifting attention to accuracy can reduce misinformation online. Nature, 592(7855), 590–595. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-03344-2
Serra-Garcia, M., & Gneezy, U. (2021). Mistakes, overconfidence, and the effect of sharing on detecting lies. American Economic Review, 111(10), 3160–3183. https://doi.org/10.1257/aer.20201548
Taber, K. S. (2018). The use of Cronbach's alpha when developing and reporting research instruments in science education. Research in Science Education, 48(6), 1273–1296. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11165-016-9602-2
Talwar, S., Dhir, A., Kaur, P., Zafar, N., & Alrasheedy, M. (2019). Why do people share fake news? Associations between the dark side of social media use and fake news sharing behavior. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 51, 72–82. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretconser.2019.05.026
Van Zoonen, L. (2012). I-pistemology: Changing truth claims in popular and political culture. European Journal of Communication, 27(1), 56–67. https://doi.org/10.1177/0267323112438808
Van Zoonen, W., Luoma-aho, V., & Lievonen, M. (2023). Trust but verify? Examining the role of trust in institutions in the spread of unverified information on social media. Computers in Human Behavior. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2023.107992
Warren, A. M., Sulaiman, A., & Jaafar, N. I. (2014). Social media effects on fostering online civic engagement and building citizen trust and trust in institutions. Government Information Quarterly, 31(2), 291–301. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.giq.2013.11.007
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Muhammad Nabil Syafiq, Kunto Adi Wibowo

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Copyright rules apply for the articles that are featured in COMMENTATE: Journal of Communication Management
- COMMENTATE: Journal of Communication Management holds the right to be the first to publish the article.
- Authors will still be the copyright holder for their articles published on COMMENTATE: Journal of Communication Management and can use it freely as long as it does not violate the rules.
- Papers featured on COMMENTATE: Journal of Communication Management are under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Further details can be access on Open Access Policy.






