If you’re a regular Ars reader, the concept of "astroturf organizations”—fake grassroots movements backed by large corporations—won’t be new. In the past, we’ve covered astroturfing by AT&T, cable companies, and even the Chinese government. But we haven't really addressed a key question: does astroturfing actually work?

The question hasn't been studied much, but new research in the Journal of Business Ethics says that yes, astroturf does work; however, some of the details in the results did surprise the paper's authors.

A case study

The researchers used the issue of climate change to examine just how effective astroturfing can be in changing people's perceptions. Under the guise of a marketing survey, the authors asked 278 Canadian undergraduates to participate in their experiment. The students were first polled on their knowledge and concern regarding issues such as fair trade, racism, and global warming, then told they would be viewing a website related to one of these issues in order to assess its functionality.

They were then randomly assigned to view one of eight websites focusing on climate change; these were either astroturf or grassroots websites,and were either not labeled with a funding source or were labeled with: “Funded from donations by people like you,” “Funded by Exxon-Mobil,” or “Funded by grants from the Conservation Heritage Fund.”

The websites were all created for this experiment, but they employed arguments from actual grassroots and astroturf organizations. The design, structure, and length of the websites were all kept constant.

Once the participants had perused the sites, they were again asked how they felt about the issue, as well as how credible the website was. Of course, to keep up appearances, they were also asked about the site’s functionality and design. One group of 78 participants served as a control group and did not view any website.

How effective is astroturfing?

The main finding: astroturfing works. Students who had viewed a website with astroturf arguments were not only less certain about the cause of global warming than they had been before; they also believed that the issue was less important than they had previously thought.

This effect was stronger for those who were not as involved or as knowledgeable about climate change. However, even students who had indicated that they were deeply involved and highly knowledgeable about the issue were significantly affected by the astroturf claims.

This shift came despite the fact that the students didn't find the material very convincing. Those who viewed the astroturf sites didn’t tend to trust the organization behind it and didn’t believe the information provided was particularly credible. Nevertheless, they still felt more uncertain about the causes and importance of climate change after reading the claims than they had before.

Listing the organization's source of funding on the website had no discernable effect on the students’ perceptions, either. The responses of participants who had viewed sites "Funded by Exxon-Mobil" were not different than those who had viewed sites funded by the "Conservation Heritage Fund," by "donations by people like you," or sites that did not list the source of funding at all.

What does it all mean?

The research has definite drawbacks. First, a group of Canadian undergrads might not be the most representative population. Furthermore, climate change is only one of many controversial issues tackled by astroturfers, so there are questions about whether the results are applicable across issues.

However, it’s clear that, under some circumstances, astroturf organizations work quite well. While the websites in this study weren’t created by the organizations themselves, this methodology did allow the researchers to keep many variables constant and show that the effect is probably due to the rhetoric of uncertainty and doubt used by each type of organization.

Journal of Business Ethics, 2011. DOI: 10.1007/s10551-011-0950-6 (About DOIs).