Development and validation of a tool for detecting misinformation risk in diet, nutrition, and health content (Diet-MisRAT)

Alex Ruani et al., Scientific Reports (Nature Portfolio), available here.

This study introduces the Diet-Nutrition Misinformation Risk Assessment Tool (Diet-MisRAT), a new tool that not only identifies diet and nutrition misinformation online but also evaluates the content’s risk for potential harm. Unlike existing approaches, the tool identifies misinformation that is not overtly false but still has the potential to mislead, particularly among vulnerable groups.

The tool assesses how risk depends on the content, context and how likely a recipient is to be misled, and ranks material according to a weighted misinformation risk score. It will help policymakers, digital platforms and regulators prioritise their responses to harmful misleading content.

For more information, contact Alex Ruani.