'Do your own research': affordance activation and disinformation spread.

Affordances are the perception of what a technical artifact can do. They bridge a technically-determinist perspective with social constructivist theory, acknowledging the material aspects of technology while allowing for user agency. Yet most affordance theory separates out the engagement process into producers and consumers. On one hand, this lens is essential because it considers how an end user interprets, engages, and utilizes technology through their social structure. It highlights how engagement is both constrained and enabled by the creator, but also documents how such engagement might differ from a creator's intention(s) completely. On the other hand, this framework doesn't consider the interactional dimensions of affordances theory. This paper fills this gap, relying on sociotechnical theory to analyze three case studies across three different platforms (Twitter, Google Scholar, and Yandex). In doing so, we explain how pundits, propagandists, and conspiracy theorists 'activate affordances' to validate their claims. When audiences are primed to 'do their own research,' disinformation becomes a more entangled, participatory process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]