Replication Data for Lateral Reading: College Students Learn to Critically Evaluate Internet Sources in an Online Course

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced college students to spend more time online. Yet many studies show that college students struggle to discern fact from fiction on the Internet. A small body of research suggests that students in face-to-face settings can improve at judging the credibility of online sources. But what about asynchronous remote instruction? In an asynchronous college nutrition course at a large state university, we embedded modules that taught students how to vet websites using fact checkers’ strategies. Chief among these strategies was lateral reading, the act of leaving an unknown website to consult other sources to evaluate the original site. Students improved significantly from pretest to posttest, engaging in lateral reading more often post intervention. These findings inform efforts to scale this type of intervention in higher education.新型冠状病毒肺炎（COVID-19）疫情暴发后，高校学生被迫将更多时间投入线上学习与活动。然而多项研究显示，高校学生普遍难以在互联网上甄别信息真伪。现有少量研究表明，身处面对面授课场景的学生，其在线信源可信度评判能力可得到提升。但异步远程教学场景下的学生又将如何？本研究于某大型公立大学的异步营养学本科课程中，嵌入了教授学生运用事实核查人员的策略核验网站的教学模块。该类策略的核心为横向阅读（lateral reading），即脱离待评估的未知网站，转而查阅其他信源以对原网站进行可信度核验的行为。学生在前测至后测的表现中提升显著，且干预后更频繁地运用横向阅读策略。本研究结果可为高等教育领域规模化推广此类教学干预方案提供参考借鉴。