The experimental study
This study experimentally tested the effectiveness of cognitive inoculation against documented FIMI content. Participants reacted to a series of pieces of content as they circulate online, then the dossier was declassified: the real origin of each piece and the manipulation technique used. On the primary outcome, the result is null.
- Type
- A randomised controlled trial, conducted online.
- Audience
- Adults; participation is voluntary and anonymous.
- Status
- Data collection complete (502 completers).
- Primary result
- Null: on the credibility of the FIMI stimuli, the inoculated group does not differ from the control group (d ≈ −0.10, p = 0.29); no difference in sharing intention.
- Ethics approval
- The protocol was approved by a research ethics committee before recruitment opened; the file reference is available on request.
- Pre-registration
- Hypotheses and analysis plan pre-registered on Zenodo (DOI 10.5281/zenodo.20403018).
A null primary result
On the primary outcome, the inoculated group does not differ from the control group (a small, non-significant difference). The thesis reads this as support for structural and environmental measures rather than reliance on individual inoculation alone.
full statistical tests: manuscript, chapter 5
- No identifying personal data is collected.
- Processing complies with the GDPR; responses are aggregated for research purposes only.
- You may stop the session at any moment, without giving a reason.
- You may download your own responses at the end of the session.
- The aggregated and anonymised results will be published after the defence.
For any question about the study or your data, see the contact page.
The study did not reduce citizens to "a data point". It refused to treat them as merely the terrain of an operation.
FIMI operations treat citizens as surfaces: targets whose reaction is measured without ever handing control back to them. This study reversed the gesture: it showed the techniques, let people recognise them, then explained what they had just seen.
In five minutes, each participant did two things at once: strengthening their own reading of manipulated content and contributing to work that seeks, more broadly, to equip democratic judgement. The primary result is null, but it is informative: it shifts the effort from individual defences alone towards structural ones.