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ABSTRACT
In this post-truth era, fake news on social media has emerged as a societal problem, where objective facts have increasingly become less influential. Although there is a recent spike in fake news research, it has progressed without a proper agenda or a theoretical framework and has been fragmented. This systematic literature review (SLR) aims to organize the fragmented literature on fake news, focusing on the psychosocial antecedents of its spread on social media and the impact due to such spread. Accordingly, we systematically analyzed fifty-six empirical studies using standard protocols to delineate the current research profile and future research areas. The research themes emerging from the SLR are (a) the need for a theoretical and methodological grounding for understanding the fake news problem on social media; (b) the person, behavior, and environmental factors for the fake news spread on social media; and (c) social, economic, and psychological impacts due to fake news on social media. This study also argues for expanding the current research horizon by relying on new research methods and focusing on under-investigated psychosocial factors. The study may help policymakers plan and execute human-centric policy measures for combating fake news on social media by focusing on an individual's psychosocial factors.
Keywords: Fake news, Disinformation, Spread, Impact, Social media, Systematic review
INTRODUCTION
The proliferation of fake news as a vitiating element in the social media environment has become a significant concern in society. The easy access to new media and social media technologies has left the ground open for all. No rules bind them, except for some technologically driven solutions that have proved too inadequate to check the surge of fake news on social media, resulting in dangerous consequences. For instance, a claim that there is a spiritual reason behind the spread of the Coronavirus was wrongly attributed to Bill Gates and was widely shared on social media platforms, such as Facebook and WhatsApp (BBC, 2020). Again, the spread of fake news on social media is the key reason for vaccine hesitancy (reluctance or refusal to vaccinate despite vaccines' availability), which has become a significant threat to global health (WHO, 2019). Fake news, defined as "fabricated information that mimics news media content in form but not in organizational process or intent" (Lazer...