Replication Data for: One-Third of Pseudoscience Traffic Comes from Search: A Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Analysis

This dataset is from the article titled “One-Third of Pseudoscience Traffic Comes from Search: A Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Analysis.” The data is presented in a CSV table, and the columns are described as follows:

<ul>
<li><strong>url:</strong> The URL of the pseudoscience or pro-science website.</li>
<li><strong>label:</strong> See “Misinformation Domain List” by Lasser (2022).</li>
<li><strong>source:</strong> See “Misinformation Domain List” by Lasser (2022).</li>
<li><strong>accuracy:</strong> See “Misinformation Domain List” by Lasser (2022).</li>
<li><strong>transparency:</strong> See “Misinformation Domain List” by Lasser (2022).</li>
<li><strong>type:</strong> See “Misinformation Domain List” by Lasser (2022).</li>
<li><strong>traffic:</strong> Data on web traffic derived from the online platform Semrush*.</li>
<li><strong>direct:</strong> Traffic to a domain via URLs entered in a browser’s search bar, saved bookmarks or links from outside a browser (such as PDFs or Microsoft Word documents); Category description provided by Semrush.</li>
<li><strong>referral:</strong> Traffic to a domain from a hyperlink on another domain (as long as it is not a Social Media domain); Category description provided by Semrush.</li>
<li><strong>organic search:</strong> Traffic to a domain directly from organic results on a SERP from a search engine such as Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, etc.; Category description provided by Semrush.</li>
<li><strong>paid search:</strong> Traffic to a domain driven by text, PLA, local, or any other kind of paid advertisement on a SERP from a search engine such as Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, etc.; Category description provided by Semrush.</li>
<li><strong>organic social:</strong> Traffic to a domain from links on social media websites like Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Pinterest, YouTube, etc.; Category description provided by Semrush.</li>
<li><strong>paid social:</strong> Traffic to a domain from paid advertisements on social media websites like Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Pinterest, YouTube, etc.; Category description provided by Semrush.</li>
<li><strong>email:</strong> Traffic to a domain via email services such as Gmail, Yahoo, iCloud or domains with corporate email addresses.; Category description provided by Semrush.</li>
<li><strong>display ads:</strong> Traffic driven to a domain through a display or video ad supported by an advertising platform such as GDN or doubleclick.; Category description provided by Semrush.</li>
<li><strong>SEO effort score:</strong> Overall SEO effort score produced by the search engine optimization (SEO) classification tool mentioned in the paper.</li>
</ul>

References:
<ul>
<li>Lasser, J. (2022). GitHub—JanaLasser/misinformation_domains: Collection of domains that spread misinformation from various sources [Dataset]. GitHub. https://github.com/JanaLasser/misinformation_domains</li>
<li>* https://www.semrush.com/</li>
</ul>