Narrative Strategies of Misinformation in Southern Thailand: A Qualitative Inquiry

Phirakan Kai-nunna, Abdunroni Samaeng

Abstract


In a rapidly changing communication world, social media has become the primary platform for people to receive information. At the same time, it is also fertile ground for various forms of misinformation designed to manipulate people into becoming victims. This research aims to study the narrative strategies of misinformation spread on social media. In this qualitative study, textual analysis was applied to 87 items of misinformation collected from 24 volunteers from the Southern Consumer Network of Thailand. The five main themes of misinformation were identified as follows: online job scams, health misinformation, online loan scams, phishing text messages, and gamified reward scams. Three themes with the highest frequency of occurrence were selected for textual analysis in order to examine their narrative strategies. The research revealed that the key narrative strategies include fabricating legitimacy, targeting emotional vulnerabilities, and offering frictionless shortcuts. Thai cultural contexts are also incorporated into the narrative, redefining misinformation as a form of well-intentioned propaganda to be spread to others. Some share misinformation in the belief that forwarding it earns merit. Addressing and combating this threat therefore cannot rely solely on narrative strategy; it also requires the application of advances in data science and data mining to proactively detect misinformation, as well as relying on integrated national and international collaboration among government sectors, private sectors, and platform providers to fight misinformation, while simultaneously promoting media literacy skills among the public.

 

Keywords: Emotional vulnerability, misinformation, narrative paradigm, online scams, social media.

 

https://doi.org/10.17576/JKMJC-2026-4203-27


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