COVID-19 News Research Articles

Factors affecting COVID-19's mental health impact on college students in the southeastern United States.

Emerging evidence confirms COVID-19's negative impact on college students' mental health; however, more research is needed to identify factors that promoted or hindered college students' mental health early in the pandemic. This exploratory study addressed this need. Participants were 697 students attending a large, state, urban university in the southeastern United States. Using a cross-sectional survey design, participants completed an anonymous, online survey assessing socio-demographic variables, mental health issues, and activities during the lockdown period in 2020. Findings suggest college students in the southeastern US who were women or transgender men and had pre-existing mental health conditions, fewer routine activities, and high exposure to COVID-19 news reported more mental health problems early in the pandemic. Students who exercised daily had fewer symptoms of anxiety and post-traumatic stress than students who exercised monthly, but there were no differences in emotional responses to COVID-19 based on exercise frequency. Tailored strategies to address college students' needs in response to the current or future pandemics are needed and should take into consideration factors that promote or hinder mental health. Patient or Public Contribution: College students were participants in this study. College students who were not participants in this study assisted with the implementation of this study.

COVID-19 pandemic-related news and Chinese commodities futures: Time-frequency connectedness and causality-in-quantiles approaches

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on the global economy and commodity markets, making it essential to study its effects. We aim to learn the dynamic spillovers between COVID-19 pandemic-related news and Chinese commodities futures (Energy, Petrochemical, Non-ferrous metals, Oil & Fats, and Softs) using time-frequency connectedness and causality-in-quantiles approaches. To capture the diverse impacts of different types of COVID-19 news, we utilize a range of COVID-19 news-related indices based on media news data from January 2, 2020, to October 28, 2022. Based on static connectedness data, it is evident that Petrochemical and Energy futures commodities are the primary contributors and recipients in our research samples. The short- and long-term data sets consistently demonstrate that COVID-19 uncertainty is the main recipient, and they have heterogeneous effects on the commodities. Interestingly, the Coronavirus Panic Index and Coronavirus Media Hype Index show the greatest influence on commodities. Dynamic data reveals that the level of connectedness among the markets fluctuates significantly over time, and short-term connectedness is higher than that in the long term. The non-parametric Granger causality test shows that COVID-19 uncertainty can significantly impact commodities futures in China. Specifically, the results remain robust even when utilizing various uncertainty measures and distinct quantiles.

Community's perception of lockdown ascribed to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The COVID-19 pandemic caused a mandatory nationwide lockdown from March 24, 2020. In this difficult and unprecedented time, the requirement to adapt to lockdown and a forced stay-at-home had an impact on people's lives. Community's perception of lockdown ascribed to COVID-19 pandemic. A cross-sectional study was done on individuals aged 18 and above across India, to assess their perception regarding lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The study was carried out using a semi-structured questionnaire, where the data were collected via Google Forms and analyzed via Epi info 7. The questionnaire comprised of how individuals perceived the lockdown, and how COVID-19 news circulating on various social media platforms and news channels affected their mental health. The study included a total of 552 individuals. The study found that the lockdown was supported by 47% of respondents. 69.9% participants acknowledged that during lockdown, a huge amount of COVID-19 news was being disseminated, while 67.2% of individuals were overly preoccupied with thinking about preventative measures. As a result of being confined indoors, 59% of respondents thought their screen time had increased. Respondents perceived that the lockdown had its benefits and drawbacks. They were impacted by the flood of information from various social media platforms as well and there was an increase in screen time.

Breaking (Fake) News: No Personal Relevance Effect on Misinformation Vulnerability.

The massive spread of fake news (FN) requires a better understanding of both risks and protective psychological factors underlying vulnerability to misinformation. Prior studies have mostly dealt with news that do not bear any direct personal relevance to participants. Here, we ask whether high-stakes news topics may decrease vulnerability to FN. Data were collected during the national lockdown in Italy (COVID-19 news) and one year later (political news). We compared truth discrimination and overall belief for true news (TN) and FN concerning COVID-19 and political topics. Our findings indicate that psychological risk and protective factors have similar effects on truth discrimination, regardless of whether the news topic is highly or minimally personally relevant. However, we found different effects of psychological factors on overall belief, for high and low personal relevance. These results suggest that, given a high level of cognitive dissonance, individuals tend to rely on proximal or emotional sources of information. In summary, our study underscores the importance of understanding the psychological factors that contribute to vulnerability to misinformation, particularly in high-stakes news contexts.

A Critical Discourse Analysis of News Reports on Covid-19 from The New York Times and China Daily

Abstract A multimodal critical discourse analysis of The New York Times and China Daily’s news reports of Covid-19 was conducted to identify the ideologies in Covid-19 news reports. The Covid-19 pandemic was divided into three phases: China’s anti-pandemic phase, first global outbreak, and second global outbreak. The nyt and cd’s Covid-19 news reports not only conveyed facts but also served different ideologies which shifted over each phase. Both the nyt and cd news media employed lexical devices, images, and metaphors to convey different ideologies, shaping people’s perceptions of the pandemic and government measures to control it. The nyt’s Covid-19 reporting implied that China’s pandemic measures were irrational and extreme, and that the Trump administration’s policies during the outbreak were ineffective, while feminism and racism also appeared. cd’s news reports of the pandemic portrayed efficiency by the Chinese government’s in controlling Covid-19 and a positive attitude toward government officials.

A Study of Argument Patterns in COVID-19 News on Web Portals: Based on the Discourse on Vaccine Side Effects

A Study of Argument Patterns in COVID-19 News on Web Portals: Based on the Discourse on Vaccine Side Effects

One Year Later, Why Are People Still Avoiding COVID-19 News?: Understanding Predictors of News Avoidance in Indonesia

The global effect of COVID-19 pandemic has continued for almost two consecutive years. Indonesia is also among the countries most impacted by the SARS-CoV2 virus under this period. Consequently, certain challenges tend to occur as regards public interest in accessing or deterring recent information associated with the disease. While there are increasing interests among media and communication scholars in understanding why people are avoiding news, little attention has been given to this audience behaviour during a global crisis like coronavirus outbreak. Using news avoidance as the main concept, this research is aimed at examining the critical factors that influence news avoidance in low-choice media environments, particularly in the Global South like Indonesia. Employing a face-to-face survey with 1,000 participants in Banten Province, Indonesia, this study found that younger people with lesser interest in COVID-19 related issues appear more prone to avoid this news, in addition to their level of news overload. Nevertheless, we also found that gender and the level of education factors did not influence whether people distanced themselves with negative coverage of coronavirus news in the country during the first year of the pandemic. Furthermore, the perception of information overload and minimal trust in news sources greatly contributed to the avoidance situation. Keywords: Audience, COVID-19, news avoidance, news trust, news consumption.

The Shapes of the Fourth Estate During the Pandemic: Profiling COVID-19 News Consumption in Eight Countries

News media is often referred to as the Fourth Estate, a recognition of its political power. New understandings of how media shape political beliefs and influence collective behaviors are urgently needed in an era when public opinion polls do not necessarily reflect election results and users influence each other in real-time under algorithm-mediated content personalization. In this work, we measure not only the average but also the distribution of audience political leanings for different media across different countries. The methodological components of these new measurements include a high-fidelity COVID-19 tweet dataset; high-precision user geolocation extraction; and user political leaning estimated from the within-country retweet networks involving local politicians. We focus on geolocated users from eight countries, profile user leaning distribution for each country, and analyze bridging users who have interactions across multiple countries. Except for France and Turkey, we observe consistent bi-modal user leaning distributions in the other six countries, and find that cross-country retweeting behaviors do not oscillate across the partisan divide. More importantly, this study contributes a new set of media bias estimates by averaging the leaning scores of users who share the URLs from media domains. Through two validations, we find that the new average audience leaning scores strongly correlate with existing media bias scores. Lastly, we profile the COVID-19 news consumption by examining the audience leaning distribution for top media in each country, and for selected media across all countries. Those analyses help answer questions such as: Does center media Reuters have a more balanced audience base than partisan media CNN and Fox News in the US? Does far-right media Breitbart attract any left-leaning readers in any countries? Does CNN reach a more balanced audience base in the US than in UK and Spain? In sum, our data-driven methods allow us to study media that are not often collected in editor-curated media bias reporting, especially in non-English-speaking countries. We hope that such cross-country research would inform media outlets of their effectiveness and audience bases in different countries, inform non-government and research organizations about the country-specific media audience profiles, and inform individuals to reflect on our day-to-day media diet.

Ideological Positioning in Covid-19 News Reportage in Ghana

This study investigates the different ideological positions in news reportage on COVID-19 between April to August, 2020, reported on Citi TV, Joy News and TV3. The research examines lexical choices in the news that enact ideological positions following the assumptions of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) as the main instrument of analysis for the news reports. It became evident from the analysis that the ideological positioning in the three TV stations are represented differently. Whereas Citi TV tends to use lexical choices to minimize the seriousness of the pandemic, Joy News uses lexical choices to hold the government and stakeholders accountable to affected patients. Lexical choices used by TV3, on the other hand, employs words to appeal to Ghanaians to adhere to safety protocols by providing facts from credible sources. The news reports on COVID-19 demonstrates how the three TV stations reported on the same pandemic in vastly different ways through particular uses of lexicon that reflected their differing ideological positions and national interests.

Felicity Condition of Expressive Speech Act Uttered by Public Figures in Covid-19 News

Abstract. This research aims to identify the expressive speech act and its felicity condition uttered by high-profile figures. It specifically attempts to recognize the types of expressive speech act, the intended meaning of those expressive speech act types, and their felicity conditions. The qualitative method was applied to accomplish those study objectives. The data were high-profile figures’ utterances collected from covid-19 related news on an online news site (https://www.merdeka.com/). This research focuses on the expressive speech acts since they are also known as evaluative speech acts. Moreover, analyzing expressive speech acts uttered by public figures in covid-19 related news may give insight on how the Indonesia’s government manage covid-19 cases. The results confirm that the utterances taken from that site fulfilled some types of expressive speech act, namely praising, thanking, deploring, lamenting, congratulating, and flattering. The intended meaning of those types of expressive speech act are determined by interpreting the speakers’ intention based on the context. Furthermore, the felicity condition of each expressive speech act type is discovered by conducting four formulas, which are preparatory condition, propositional content, sincerity condition, and essential condition. These formulas determine the validity of the utterances. Thus, people reading the news can refer that the utterances are not hoaxes. Keywords: Expressive Speech Act, Felicity Condition, Covid-19, Public Figures

The Identification of Covid-19 Fake News Factors on Social Media in Indonesia

Social media is a protocol for people’s interaction and disseminating new ideas. The spread of fake information can occur on social media because there is no control and verification from the legal account. During the COVID-19 corona virus outbreak, the government issued a self-isolation policy. However, people use social media to find information about COVID-19 and spread news about COVID-19 greedily, especially in Indonesia. Therefore, this study explores the factors influencing the spread of fake news related to COVID-19. The sampling used in this study was non-random/non-probability sampling with the Convenience Sampling technique, including two hundred and twenty-two respondences from several regions in Indonesia. These phenomenons are studied using the Uses and Gratification framework by eliminating entertainment variables, adding altruism motivation, and adding moderating variables for demographic factors of individual psychological well-being, including age, education, income, and gender. Data were analyzed using Smart Partial Least Squares (PLS) to determine the effect of five variables. The analysis results show that all the variables, e.g., altruism, socialization, time elapsed, information sharing, and information seeking, as well as moderating variables and demographic factors of individual psychological well-being have no positive and significant effect on the spread of fake COVID-19—news on social media in Indonesia.

Analisis Penerapan Kode Etik Jurnalistik dalam Penulisan Berita Covid-19 di Headline Koran Harian Radar Madura Pamekasan

The analysis of the journalistic code of ethics is an effort to observe something in depth about the standard norms that must be used as a reference for juornalists in acting, acting, and behaving when carrying out their profession as journalist in writing news. In this study, the researcher discusses whether the print media Radar Madura Pamekasan applies the journalistic code of ethics contained in Law No. 40 of 1999 in writing the March – December 2020 Edition of Covid-19 news and how to apply the journalistic code of ethics in writing Covid-19 news in the headlines of the daily newspaper Radar Madura Pamekasan. The result of this research is that Jawa Pos Radar Madura, Pamekasan bureau, applies the journalistic code of ethics contained in Law No. 40 of 1999 Article I states that Indonesian Journalists have the right to refuse to protect sources who do not want to know their identity or whereabouts, respect the provisions of the embarg, backround information, and off the record in accordance with the agreement. Various processes are carried out by the Jawa Pos Radar Madura print media so that the news can be published. The code of ethics is one of the main guidelines for Jawa Pos Radar Madura journalists, so that in writing the Covid-19 news, if you include your name or address, it will confirm the source or doctor in collecting data during coverage. If you include the address of the sub district village it is still common, so there are no problems in writing the news.

ANALISIS FRAMING TERHADAP PEMBERITAAN COVID-19 DI OKEZONE.COM DAN CNNINDONESIA.COM

This study examines Covid-19 coverage in two online mass media in Indonesia, okezone.com and cnnindonesia.com 11-13 and 20 April 2022 editions. In this research, researchers used Zhongdang Pan and Gerald Kosicki's framing analysis by applying descriptive qualitative research methods in the form of news text from the two online mass media. From the results of this study, researchers found that Okezone.com media news framing refers more to negative news angles where they inform about the facts and dangers of Covid-19 without warning or anything like that. Meanwhile, CNNIndonesia.com's news framing is more positive and contains an appeal. Media CNNIndonesia.com is also more inclined towards the government but still trying to be objective. The information that this media presents seems to urge the public to remain calm, even though there are still positive cases every day. In conclusion, the two online media Okezone.com and CNNIndonesia.com are able to report about Covid-19 in a frame that educates the public regarding what is currently happening objectively.
 Keywords: Covid-19 news, Online Media, Framing Analysis, Pan and Kosicki.

Daily Effects of COVID-19 News on Personal Protective Behaviors Through COVID-19 Anxiety: The Significance of Direct Wuhan Epidemic Experience.

Drawing on cognitive appraisal theory, this study investigates the effect of daily COVID-19 news on daily anxiety and protective behaviors (e.g., wearing masks and washing hands). This study proposes that such processes, leading to self-protection, are highly likely when individuals have directly experienced the Wuhan epidemic at the beginning of 2020, which is the most serious COVID-19 outbreak in history. The positive effect of daily COVID-19 news on daily protective behaviors through daily COVID-19 anxiety was examined in this study, which was hypothesized to be accentuated by direct Wuhan epidemic experience. An online survey based on the experience sample method (ESM) was conducted during the COVID-19 epidemic in Hebei Province, China, at the beginning of 2021, in which 82 working adults participated in a daily survey for five consecutive days. Once a day during the five-day period, the participants reported their daily COVID-19 news exposure, daily COVID-19 anxiety, and daily protective behaviors. Wuhan epidemic experience was measured by the place of residence of the participants during the 2020 Wuhan epidemic through a separate general survey conducted before the ESM survey. Analysis of 392day-level data confirmed the positive link between daily COVID-19 news and daily protective behaviors, mediated by daily COVID-19 anxiety (b = 0.03, SE = 0.01, p = 0.018). Furthermore, the mediated effect was significant for the participants with direct COVID-19 experience in Wuhan in 2020 (b = 0.05, SE = 0.03, p = 0.041) but not significant for those without direct experience in Wuhan (b = 0.01, SE = 0.01, p = 0.461). Thus, the results confirmed the positive moderating role of Wuhan epidemic experience. The analysis reveals the psychological mechanism through which COVID-19 information promotes self-protection measures to control the infectious disease and highlights the importance of direct COVID-19 experience in generating such an effect.

Asymmetric impact of COVID-19 news on the connectedness of the green energy, dirty energy, and non-ferrous metal markets

In the transition from dirty to green energy, non-ferrous metals are crucial. The COVID-19 pandemic has severely hampered the energy transition process and affected risk transmission between the markets for energy and metal. This article explores the asymmetric influence of COVID-19 news on the connectedness of the markets for green energy, dirty energy, and non-ferrous metal using the time-varying parameter vector autoregressive model and the nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag model. The results show that the green energy, dirty energy, and non-ferrous metal markets are closely related, with COVID-19 news acting as an external shock that strengthens this relationship. Changes in COVID-19 news increase connectedness in the short term, and diminish connectedness in the long term. Moreover, COVID-19 news has an asymmetric effect on the connectedness of the energy and metal markets. The mitigation of the coronavirus disease pandemic has a more significant impact on the connectedness than the deterioration of the pandemic. The findings can help scholars, investors, and policymakers restructure their current strategies and policies for avoiding uncertainty in the face of external shocks.

Investigation of the influencing factors with the uptake of the COVID-19 vaccine booster dose among the general population of Ardabil, Iran: A cross-sectional study.

Vaccination is one of the most efficient approaches to combating COVID-19 if it is adequately embraced by the general population. Numerous factors influence the uptake or refusal of the booster dose. The goal of this study was to look at the different factors that affect how the general population in Ardabil feels about getting vaccine boosters (annual boosters) for COVID-19 and to evaluate those feelings. In the city of Ardabil, general population, perceptions towards the COVID-19 vaccine booster (annual boosters) dose were evaluated using a cross-sectional survey design between January 2 and March 25, 2022. A questionnaire was developed and filled out by 662 subjects via phone calls from healthcare providers. Descriptive statistics, the Chi-square test, the correlation coefficient, and regression analysis were run for the analysis of quantitative data. The findings of the research revealed that 238 participants, or 35.9%, had previously gotten the booster dose of the COVID-19 vaccination, while 198 participants, or 29.2%, expressed a desire to do so as soon as feasible. A total of 187 (28.2%) respondents reported not wanting to get a booster dose, and 39 (5.7%) could not decide. In the factors found to affect decisions not to accept regular doses, adverse effects (45.4%) and the presence of misinformation (30%) were the most important. Regression in educational achievement, and following the COVID-19 news showed to be the major predictors of the subjects' attitudes toward the regular COVID-19 vaccine. The present findings revealed that low confidence in the efficiency of the booster shot and misinformation are two critical factors to consider in educational planning and interventions.

A Linguistic Interpretation of Covid-19 News

A Linguistic Interpretation of Covid-19 News

Media Frame Covid-19 News on Economic Aspect of Vaccination in Timor-Leste

To deal with the pandemic situation, the challenge of prevention, the media covers the issue of vaccination, sometimes covering both sides and also on the newspaper side. Prevention of COVID-19 is a complex and common problem, due to the economy and people who are able to provide them and tools such as hand sanitizers, masks and vaccinations. People trying to access public services, business and applying to work and other activities need to show proof of vaccines. This study aims to know the framing of the Covid-19 news in the economic aspect of vaccination in Timor-Leste. The media describe issues that are considered important and shape public opinion and agenda, leading people with certain agendas to be raised by the media and may be considered quite interesting and actual. The method used is a qualitative method with the Entman model framing analysis with fourth procedure: (1) Defining the problem; (2) diagnose causes; (3) make moral judgments; and (4) treatment recommendations. Data collected from the Independent Post with 6 news headlines April-May 2021. The results show that the media frames information about Covid-19 related to the global economy through business promotion in pharmaceuticals for supplying countries vaccines and the national economy that focus more on the strategies and policies issued by the central and local governments in response to the implementation of vaccinations to link challenges and citizen participation as the only criteria for remaining free to move for economic recovery activities. The information’s about the Covid-19 vaccines from various perspectives. The consequence of this practice is that no new information is available to the public, so the public space is only filled with news that is in line with the economic aspects of vaccination in Timor-Leste.

Discourse analysis of news frames in Philippine banner stories on COVID-19: implications for media and information literacy during crises

To understand newspapers’ Covid-19 portrayal in the Philippines and contribute to COVID-19 media framing literature, this study identified news frames in 97 banner stories of three Philippine broadsheets and determined how major frames depicted COVID-19 during its initial spread in the country (January 30 - March 25, 2020). Utilizing deductive and inductive approaches to generate news frames for coding, results yielded 12 frames in the three newspapers, with Action, New Evidence, Reassurance, Conflict, Economic Consequence, and Social Consequence as major frames. Generally, the newspapers’ pandemic depiction was similar in foregrounding government response and new COVID-19 information instead of news that invites fear and panic. Variations were found in the newspapers’ individual focus on the pandemic, conflicts about it, and its economic effects – nuances which reflected the newspapers’ reputation. Results identify the need for developing people’s critical media and information literacy skills. Studying COVID-19 news framing in developing these skills is recommended.

Correlates of Psychological Distress Among African American Young Adults During the COVID-19 Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic disproportionately affects African Americans in the United States, including disparate rates of mortality and higher mental health consequences compared to Whites. However, African American young adults are underrepresented in the literature examining psychological distress (i.e., anxiety and depression) during the COVID-19 pandemic. Factors associated with psychological distress are important to examine among African American young adults during the pandemic to better inform culturally appropriate mental health interventions during times of increased uncertainty and isolation. The present study, grounded in the transactional theory of stress and coping, was a secondary analysis of 420 African American young adults exploring gender, age, coping, fear of missing out (FOMO), and COVID-19 news exposure as correlates of anxiety and depression. Results showed that gender, age, level of resilient coping, and experiences of FOMO were associated with psychological distress. Therefore, interventions to reduce psychological distress among African American young adults may need to focus on younger individuals and women, identify adaptive coping skills during times of significant change, and target individuals who experience FOMO.