Given that Twitter itself was accused of supporting the spread of conspiracy theories and misinformation during Covid, it’s perhaps no surprise that Parler, the social network that people tended to go to after being banned from Twitter, should be a haven for the stuff.

Nonetheless, recent research from the University of Kansas is the first to fully explore that process.  The research reveals that Parler was a popular destination for people (nee conspiracy theorists) to go to discuss things like the vaccines with like-minded peers.

Unregulated speech

Parler gained notoriety as an unregulated platform that proved a natural home for those whose opinions were not supported, either by medical reality or by the ethical standards of platforms, such as Twitter, which was trying to crack down on harmful misinformation during the pandemic, including by then-president Donald Trump.

The researchers analyzed a sample of posts about the vaccines from the platform between Nov 2020 and Jan 2021.  The results show that the platform was a hive of conservative chatter and people would regularly share misinformation about the efficacy of the vaccines.

“Around October last year, we were hearing a lot of buzz around a new social media platform, Parler, not just in the political field, but in the health field as well,” the researchers say. “We wanted to understand more about what was being said about COVID-19 vaccines specifically, as we noticed a shift in the conversation from developing vaccines to distrusting science around the efficacy of vaccines.”

Topics of conversation

The analysis revealed that five core themes made up the bulk of discussions around vaccines:

• Side effects
• Population control
• The various reasons one should refuse the vaccine
• The comparison of other health issues with Covid
• The supposed risk of children getting vaccinated without parental consent

While platforms, such as Twitter, have received a lot of attention in recent years, Parler is relatively new and hit the headlines after it was deplatformed for a number of weeks after the insurrection at the US Capitol.  The researchers wanted to lift the lid on what has previously been an unexplored community.

“If you live in a bubble in which you only hear from people who share the same views as you and information that supports that, that tends to reinforce what you already believe in. It’s also about people you trust. We didn’t have demographic information on users, but we did find echo chambers existed there, and people even used the hashtag #echo,” they explain.

Spreading misinformation

Content was spread via hashtags that helped to bind the key themes together, such as #vaxaware and #novaccine, with content commonly consisting of news stories or polls showing negative side effects or vaccine hesitancy among people.

“Some of the reasons for vaccine hesitancy are deemed legit, and the major concerns may have been a result of people being skeptical of the side effects,” the researchers explain. “Currently, we have experienced cases where some vaccines have been discontinued; however, this should not deter people from getting vaccinated.”

For instance, a range of conspiracy theories were commonly shared, including the use of vaccines to control the population.  These theories would often be accompanied by links, albeit from unverified sites and unreliable sources.

The researchers believe that their findings provide a number of key lessons for those in the health communications world about the effective use of social media.  For instance, they argue that elected officials are extremely influential, and therefore must be diligent with what they say, especially on social media.

While the spread of misinformation is usually negative, the researchers believe it can also provide some valuable insight into how public health officials can counter the rhetoric used in anti-vaccination conversations.

The findings suggest that for public health officials to effectively combat misinformation, they need to utilize credible information relayed via trusted experts and stories that people can relate to.  A failure to effectively achieve this can have grave consequences in any future public health crises.