Live Poster Session: Zoom Link
Thursday, July 30th 1:15-2:30pm EDT
Abstract: Health politicization is when political cues become integrated into the public presentation of a health issue. COVID-19 is a political-communication and health-communication crisis. The pandemic has been communicated in diverse ways – through conflicting science, downplayed threats, emotional arousal, and fragmented media. Republican politicians publicly downplayed the threat, while Democratic politicians responded with more concern, signaling different public cues. Due to the novelty of this virus, science is rapidly evolving which gives rise to the appearance of expert disagreement and conflicting information. This provokes strong emotions, particularly fear and anxiety, that makes people seek out information to resolve them leading to biased searching, thus exposure to partisan-oriented and/or misleading information. Prior work has suggested that when the public perceives conflict and controversy about health issues, confusion is generated and the following decrease in trust of health recommendations is seen. It is important for us to understand the effects of politicization and media coverage of COVID-19 on confusion about health policies and scientific findings, thus the corresponding support and trust in science, government, doctors, and journalists. We fielded two studies that give us insight into public’s perception of the pandemic and its severity through media and credibility priming. We examined confusion as a function of question wording, partisan affiliation, ideology, demographics, and the priming of politicization.
WMP_Poster_Summer20_BankaLive Poster Session: Zoom Link
Thursday, July 30th 1:15-2:30pm EDT