Supporting Misinformation Education via Misinformation Tabletop Game

The goal of this project is to develop a tabletop game as a novel educational approach to help increase people’s awareness and understanding of misinformation. Research suggests that public library efforts to teach about misinformation do not sufficiently account for misinformation research in other fields and tend not to appeal to audiences that would most benefit from misinformation programs. A tabletop game, designed around a fictional theme and distributed by public libraries who are perceived as trusted institutions, offers a potentially effective and innovative vehicle for building awareness about how misinformation works, encouraging people to have conversations about misinformation, and changing people’s information behaviors when encountering problematic information. This project will employ co-design methods with librarians, students, and potential players to develop a tabletop game comprised of a series of puzzles and narrative that incorporates misinformation tactics. The final version of the game will be distributed through partner libraries. We will collect post-experience survey responses and conduct a focus group session to investigate any changes in knowledge and attitudes towards misinformation. This project will contribute to improved understanding of how collaborative interactive experience can support increased education, discussion, and awareness on misinformation.