STOP
Pause before you react
Pause and register your gut reaction.
It takes five seconds and makes your initial judgment explicit, so the investigation can't just confirm whatever you already felt.
Content generated with the help of Google Omni and Eleven Labs
Before doing anything else, name your instinctive response: Do I believe this? Am I unsure? Do I feel a strong emotion — fear, outrage, urgency, relief? Emotionally charged content works by triggering a fast, intuitive reaction before slower, reflective thinking can catch up. STOP is the pre-commitment moment that opens space for that slower thinking.
Ask yourself
Reflection prompts to use in the moment
- 1What is my honest first reaction — believe, doubt, or unsure?
- 2What emotion is this making me feel right now?
- 3Is that emotion pushing me to act, share, or decide quickly?
- 4Would stepping away for a moment change how this looks?
Borrowed from digital-forensics practice, pre-commitment means forming an explicit judgment before consulting any tool or evidence. It prevents anchoring on what you find and lets you honestly compare 'before' and 'after'. Motivated reasoning — agreeing with content because it fits what we already believe — is one of the strongest predictors of false acceptance. Strong emotion is not proof that something is fake; real emergencies feel urgent too. The point is to treat intense feeling as a cue that slower evaluation is needed — and small habits like pausing or briefly stepping back measurably reduce reactive sharing.
“It takes five seconds and makes your initial judgment explicit, so the investigation can't just confirm whatever you already felt.”
Framework progress
Continue to Source
You've explored Stop — read the next guide or jump straight into a guided case.
Read Source guide