Reviewing the landscape of research on the threats to the quality of user‐generated content

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe objective of the paper is to review and synthesize scholarly articles on the threats to the quality of usergenerated content (UGC). In this paper, threats to the quality of UGC are defined as the perpetration of misleading information caused by the lack of editorial control. They include deception, disinformation, manipulation, misinformation and rumors whose veracity cannot be easily established. In particular, this paper identifies (a) the research objectives that had been investigated, (b) the research methods that had been employed, and (c) the disciplines that studied the threats to the quality of UGC. The dominant research objective includes investigating the dynamics of threats. The most widely adopted research methods include quantitative analysis of real world data. This area of research was found to attract both intra‐disciplinary and inter‐disciplinary scholarly attention. It even attracted attention from practitioners affiliated to non‐academic institutes. Finally, this paper serves as a call for scholars to identify possible ways to mitigate the threats to the quality of UGC. It also encourages the use of qualitative approaches.