The danger of rumor in the age of COVID-19

REO Speedwagon warned us of the source and impact of rumors in their 1981 hit song “Take It On The Run” with the opening lyrics: “Heard it from a friend who… Heard it from a friend who…Heard it from another…”

Merriam-Webster defines a rumor as “talk or opinion widely disseminated with no discernible source” and “a statement or report current without known authority for its truth.”

In 1973 a congressman heard from his constituents of a shortage of pulp. Bolstered by reports of tissue shortages in Japan and the government purchase of toilet tissue falling short, he issued a press release speculating on future shortages of toilet paper. Johnny Carson then picked up on this and joked during his monolog to 20 million views: “But have you heard the latest? I’m not kidding. I saw it in the papers. There’s a shortage of toilet paper!” This resulted in panic buying by millions, clearing store shelves and almost doubling the price of a roll of toilet paper.

In these days of coronavirus pandemic crises, we are bombarded with rumors of shortages, doom and gloom and every sort of potential cure. This has resulted in store shelves being cleared of bread, eggs, meat and — of course — toilet paper! There are many reasons that rumors spread and why some people are so quick to believe them.

In “Rumor Has It: Understanding and Managing Rumors” John Doorley and Helio Fred Gracia explain that some people see retelling a rumor as a status-enhancing activity. They quote French sociologist Jean-Nöel Kapferer as saying, “By taking others into his confidence and sharing a secret with them, the transmitter’s personal importance is magnified. He comes across as the holder of precious knowledge, a sort of front-runner scout — creating a favorable impression in the minds of those he informs.”

And once a rumor is sensationalized by the media its legitimacy is assured, reinforced by circular reporting — each outlet using another to corroborate mutually flawed accounts, a media that too often has proved to be more interested in being first than in being accurate.

That said, Brandon Brewer — in “Managing Negativity and Rumors During Crisis” — notes how “it’s very frustrating to tell people the truth about a situation and then listen to them deny that truth because it conflicts with their pre-conceived ideas, beliefs or agenda.”

Research conducted by Kilhoe Na, R. Kelly Garrett and Michael D, Slater and reported in the Journal of Health Communication found that: “When there is congruence between an individual’s current emotion and the emotion induced by a rumor, he or she is more likely accept the rumor as true.” In “Health Literacy and Use and Trust in Health Information” published in the same journal, researchers concluded: “People with lower health literacy were less likely to trust health information from specialist doctors and dentists, but more likely to trust television, social media, blogs/celebrity webpages, friends, and pharmaceutical companies.”

The simple children’s game of “Telephone” gives practical credence to these studies. Remember when one kid would say something into the ear of another who would pass it on to the next and so on down the line. After just five or six retellings, the story was often significantly altered from the initial statement.

In these trying times of pandemic when we are all home and relying on the telephone, e-mail and social media to maintain contact with the outside world, rumors can be forwarded to hundreds, thousands or tens of thousands of people at the speed of light. We need to approach these with skepticism; seek the authoritative sources to be certain information is accurate and read carefully what is actually being said.

We cannot take promising avenues as certainty, opinions of lay persons as fact or seize on worst-case scenarios as definite conclusions.

REO Speedwagon recognized all this in “Take It On The Run’s” later lyrics “But I know the neighborhood … And talk is cheap when the story is good … And the tales grow taller on down the line…”

John M. DeMaggio is a retired Special Agent in Charge for the U.S. Postal Service Inspector General. He is also a retired Captain in the U.S. Navy, where he served in Naval Intelligence. The above is the opinion of the author and is not meant to reflect the opinion of the U.S. Navy or the U.S. Government.