Artist captures COALESCE Hub discussion about misinformation
The COALESCE Hubs were asked to reflect on the role they can play in addressing mis- and disinformation, and the artist Edgar Sanjuan captured it all in an infographic that will be available as part of the European Competence Centre for Science Communication resources in the future.
The session on misinformation was one of a series of events involving COALESCE Hub representatives held in Madrid on 24 and 25 September 2025. The illustration created by Sanjuan, a visual thinker and founder of Made Thinking, is now made public for the first time.
The Madrid session was organised as a discussion game, designed and produced by the Science Communication Unit at the University of the West of England (UWE Bristol), SISSA Medialab and Formicablu. The cards used in this discussion game were of two kinds: one showing 10 types of mis- and disinformation, and the other set with 13 science-related topics usually subject to the distortion of facts, such as vaccines or food supplements.
Around 30 participants from 17 countries were asked to consider the topics that generate the most mis/disinformation in their countries, regardless of whether these topics were represented in the cards. They were also asked to consider the underlying causes of this mis/disinformation, its impact on their work, and their potential role in addressing it.
The discussions highlighted how the overload of misinformation demands that COALESCE Hubs, in their daily practice, devote more time to checking the credibility of sources, to fact-checking information, and to actively debunking mis/disinformation, which demands more training and research on these topics. To keep up with the challenges, they propose that education is redesigned to encompass media literacy, AI tools provide credible and reviewed resources, and online algorithms are made more transparent.
The Competence Centre platform services are being developed using co-creative processes involving the Hubs and others. Resources for science communicators relating to mis- and disinformation will be released in the Competence Centre in 2026. Additionally, Competence Centre training is being offered on identifying and tackling mis- and disinformation to science communicators.
