An ERP exploration of the perception of text-based deception

Online misinformation poses significant risks to public well-being, for example, during public health crises. A substantial portion of online misinformation is wilful deception disseminated in text format, such as in online forums or the comment sections of social media. This work investigates how individuals evaluate the deceptiveness of text-based information and the associated neural underpinnings. Brief vignettes describing situations in which a person might lie were presented, followed by a critical statement that could vary according to three factors: truthfulness, semantic fluency, and syntactic correctness. Two event-related potential components associated with language processing were analyzed, the N400 and P600. A novel variant of the N400 was revealed by comparing truths to lies, and the amplitude of this variant was predictive of veracity judgments on a trial-by-trial basis. This variant of the N400 could serve as a useful tool for further research into how people evaluate the veracity of online information.