Selective exposure to COVID-19 vaccination information: the influence of prior attitude, perceived threat level and information limit

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ke Li ◽  
Yujia Li ◽  
Pengyi Zhang

PurposeThe massive amount of available information and functionality of the Internet makes selective information seeking effortless. This paper aims to understand the selective exposure to information during a health decision-making task.Design/methodology/approachThis study conducted an experiment with a sample of 36 students to examine the influence of prior attitude, perceived threat level and information limit on users’ selective exposure to and recall of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccination information. Participants were assigned to two conditions with or without an upper limit of the number of articles to be examined, and this study collected the number of articles read, the number of articles included in the report and recall score of the articles after one day of the experiment.FindingsThis study found that (1) participants with a negative attitude were more inclined to view attitude-consistent information and recalled attitude-consistent information more accurately, while participants with a positive attitude viewed more balanced information; (2) participants perceiving higher health threat level recalled attitude-consistent information more accurately; and (3) an upper limit on the number of articles to be viewed does not have any impact on selective exposure.Research limitations/implicationsThe findings of this paper pinpoint the disparity of influence of positive and negative attitudes on selective exposure to and selective recall of health information, which was not previously recognized.Practical implicationsVaccination campaigns should focus on reaching people with negative attitudes who are more prone to selective exposure to encourage them to seek more balanced information.Originality/valueThis is the first paper to explore selective exposure to COVID-19 vaccination information. This study found that people with a negative attitude and a higher level of perceived health threat are more prone to selective exposure, which was not found in previous research.

2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Chengxin Xu ◽  
Yixin Liu

Associating a life-threatening crisis with a geographic locality can stigmatize people from that area. However, such a strategy may reduce the public blame attributed to the government because the perceived foreign threat establishes a scapegoat, which transfers that blame. In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, we investigated whether the “Chinese Virus” label placed on COVID-19 has elicited opposition to Chinese immigrants and reduced public blame attributed to the federal government. We used a survey experiment during the COVID-19 pandemic, and a list experiment to measure perceived threat. The descriptive analysis suggested a negative attitude toward Chinese immigrants overall, in which conservatives expressed stronger negative attitudes than did liberals and moderates. While labelling COVID-19 as the “Chinese Virus” did not make a difference overall, our exploratory results shows that it led to a significant increase in liberals’ perception that Chinese immigrants are a threat. However, the “Chinese Virus” label showed no effect overall in reducing the extent to which either liberals or conservatives’ attributed blame to the federal government.


2021 ◽  
pp. 009365022110436
Author(s):  
Hyungjin Gill ◽  
Hernando Rojas

False consensus, or biased projection of one’s opinion onto others, has repeatedly been described by political communication scholars as a derivative of selective exposure to attitude-consistent information. This study proposes a distinctive approach to understanding the phenomenon by suggesting “perceived threat” as a motivational factor that contributes to self-serving estimates of public opinion. Based on a nationally representative sample of U.S. adults, we test a path model in which political ideology relates to false consensus regarding the issue of immigration through cognitive assessments of communication environment and perceived immigration threat. Results suggest that the relationship between cognition and false consensus may not be direct but instead works through motivational factors when one perceives threat, and that conservatives are more sensitive to outgroup threat and thus are more likely to overestimate public consensus for their attitudes on immigration than their ideological counterparts. Implications of these findings are discussed.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Banda

BACKGROUND Occupational conditions are deadly health hazards especially where dust exposure is inevitable causing chronic disabilities, impaired respiratory function and ultimately leading to death if no intensive measures are put in place. Unhealthy practices and negative attitudes rise in the number of cases of pneumoconiosis due to poor health education and awareness strategies. Pneumoconiosis is not only a health problem but also a social and economic burden on the livelihood of people living in mining areas around the globe. OBJECTIVE to assess knowledge, attitude and practices of miners and post-occupational miners towards pneumoconiosis in Wusakile Township, Kitwe, Zambia. METHODS A cross-sectional study was employed to conduct a research in Wusakile Township and a questionnaire was customized in order to syphon data relevant to the study as well to be brief. The study was conducted among 73 participants who were randomly selected among miners and post-occupational miners and all satisfied the inclusion criteria. Both quantitative and qualitative methods were used to collect data. The data was entered and analysed using IBM SPSS software version 23. RESULTS Among 73 participants interviewed, 33.99% of participants had poor knowledge on the complications of pneumoconiosis. However, despite this poor knowledge, all participants had an idea about pneumoconiosis particularly silicosis. 13.70% of the respondents had bad practices towards pneumoconiosis while 86.30% had some good practices towards pneumoconiosis. Of the total participants, 19.18% of the participants had a negative attitude towards pneumoconiosis. Correlation between the level of education and practices of participants using Pearson Chi-Square, a p value of 0.021 (significant) was found ruling out the null hypothesis. CONCLUSIONS Information about pneumoconiosis and awareness programs towards pneumoconiosis are not widely disseminated among miners and post-occupational miners. There is still a significant number of participants who need to be educated more about pneumoconiosis and its complications so that attitude and practices are improved and also promote full community participation by involving competent health professionals to help in implementing preventive measures.


Author(s):  
Nardeen Shafik ◽  
Savana Deeb ◽  
Kriengkrai Srithanaviboonchai ◽  
Pisittawoot Ayood ◽  
Rungnapa Malasao ◽  
...  

Human Immunodeficiency Virus self-testing (HIVST) was recently introduced in Thailand, but little is known about receptivity among its residents. Because Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) testing is a critical component of HIV prevention, it is important to understand how HIVST is perceived among potential users. The purpose of this study was to examine awareness and attitudes toward HIVST among adults in Northern Thailand. A convenience sample of 403 adult residents of the Sanpatong district, Chiang Mai Province, was interviewed using a structured questionnaire in 2019. Awareness of HIVST was low (14%), as was the overall HIVST negative attitude score (6.44; possible range of 0–14). The odds of being aware of HIVST were more than twice as high for those with more education compared to those with less (AOR = 2.29, 95% CI: 1.22–4.30), and roughly half as high for those who expressed HIV stigma compared to those who did not (AOR = 0.49, 95% CI: 0.26–0.91). Holding negative attitudes towards HIVST also was associated with lower education and expressing HIV stigma, but these relationships disappeared in multivariate analysis. Findings may be used by local health organizations to tailor HIVST education efforts.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Hao Chen ◽  
Ofir Turel ◽  
Yufei Yuan

PurposeElectronic waste (e-waste) such as discarded computers and smartphones may contain large amounts of confidential data. Improper handling of remaining information in e-waste can, therefore, drive information security risk. This risk, however, is not always properly assessed and managed. The authors take the protection motivation theory (PMT) lens of analysis to understand intentions to protect one's discarded electronic assets.Design/methodology/approachBy applying structural equation modeling, the authors empirically tested the proposed model with survey data from 348 e-waste handling users.FindingsResults highlight that (1) protection intention is influenced by the perceived threat of discarding untreated e-waste (a threat appraisal) and self-efficacy to treat the discarded e-waste (a coping appraisal) and (2) optimism bias plays a dual-role in a direct and moderating way to reduce the perceived threat of untreated e-waste and its effect on protection intentions.Originality/valueResults support the assertions and portray a unique theoretical account of the processes that underline people's motivation to protect their data when discarding e-waste. As such, this study explains a relatively understudied information security risk behavior in the e-waste context, points to the role of optimism bias in such decisions and highlights potential interventions that can help to alleviate this information security risk behavior.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sheng Xu ◽  
Mengge Zhang ◽  
Bo Xia ◽  
Jiangbo Liu

PurposeThis study aimed to identify driving factors of safety attitudinal ambivalence (AA) and explore their influence. Construction workers' intention to act safely can be instable under conflicting information from safety management, co-workers and habitual unsafe behaviour. Existing research explained the mechanism of unsafe behaviours as individual decisions but failed to include AA, as the co-existence of both positive and negative attitude.Design/methodology/approachThis study applied system dynamics to explore factors of construction workers' AA and simulate the process of mitigating the ambivalence for less safety behaviour. Specifically, the group model building approach with eight experts was used to map the causal loop diagram and field questionnaire of 209 construction workers were used to collect empirical data for initiating parameters.FindingsThe group model building identified five direct factors of AA, namely the organisational safety support, important others' safety attitude, emotional arousal, safety production experience and work pressure, with seven feedback paths. The questionnaire survey obtained the initial values of the factors in the SD model, with the average ambivalence at 0.389. The ambivalence between cognitive and affective safety attitude was the highest. Model simulation results indicated that safety experience and work pressure had the most significant effects, and safety experience and positive attitude of co-workers could compensate the pressure from tight schedule and budget.Originality/valueThis study provided a new perspective of the dynamic safety attitude under the co-existence of positive and negative attitude, identified its driving factors and their influencing paths. The group model building approach and field questionnaire surveys were used to provide convincible suggestions for empirical safety management with least and most effective approaches and possible interventions to prevent unsafe behaviour with tight schedule and budget.


2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-75 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jana Goriup ◽  
Danijela Lahe

AbstractIntroduction: With the intensive growth in the number of older people and prolonged life span in the contemporary postmodern society, it has become increasingly important to build positive intergenerational cooperation and promote education on aging and older people, especially between younger and older generations. That is why the authors, on the basis of empirical research and scientific literature, examined knowledge about aging among young people and the connection between knowledge about aging and the formation of negative attitudes towards older people.Methods: The study involved 609 secondary school students aged 15 to 19 years.Results: The survey results showed that only one-fifth of the young population has good knowledge about aging. The relationship between knowledge about aging and ageism is negative, which means that young people with less knowledge about aging often have a negative attitude towards older people.Conclusions: Based on the obtained results, the authors underline the importance of integrating gerontology content in all stages of education.


2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 314
Author(s):  
Yosefina Rosdiana Su ◽  
Fatmawati Fatmawati ◽  
Stanislaus Guna ◽  
Fransiskus Jemadi ◽  
Yovita Narsi Mat ◽  
...  

Learning English as a foreign language is very challenging for both teachers and students in Flores, East Nusa Tenggara of Indonesia. The challenges are primarily caused by their lack of exposure to the authentic environment of English. In dealing with this phenomenon, the appropriate listening practices expect to help the learners to obtain and construct their knowledge of English as well as to acquire more comprehensible input. This article reports an investigation on the EFL learners� attitudes toward the extensive listening practices. It applied mixed-method research procedures involving 55 students of the English language and education program of Universitas Katolik Indonesia Santu Paulus Ruteng. The data were collected through a survey coupled with Focus Group Discussions with 15 participants. This research revealed that the learners' attitudes are identified into two main categories called positive and negative attitudes. In this case, 38 % of the participants have positive attitudes toward extensive listening practices and 62% of the participant reflected the negative attitude toward the extensive listening practices. Learners with a positive attitude had a very strong awareness of the significance of listening skills in L2 learning. To improve their listening skills, they develop their listening practices outside the classroom consistently. Meanwhile, learners with negative attitudes were categorized as dependent learners who practiced their listening skills during the listening course only. This group of learners was less aware of the significance of listening skills in L2 learning and their listening practices were highly dependent on the teachers' instruction. It showcased that both of the learners� internal and external factors were strongly contributed to this poor extensive listening practices.� The EFL teachers are then strongly suggested to strengthen the learners� awareness on the significance of Listening Skills in L2 learning as well as design more instructed extensive listening practices outside the classroom.�


2022 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 265
Author(s):  
Sury . Utami ◽  
Rahmad . Husein ◽  
Zainuddin . Zainuddin

English conversation is an important lesson for Senior High School students in order to face the globalization effects. Many students considered English conversation as a controversial lesson through their positive and negative attitudes toward it. This study aimed to investigate the types of attitudes of the Senior High School students in learning English conversation, to describe the realization of the attitudes of Senior High School students in learning English conversations, and to explain the reason of the attitude which Senior High School students realized in the ways they are. The subjects of this study were 20 students consisting 12 females and 8 males at the age of 16-18 years old. The data were collected by observations and interviews then were analyzed using Interactive Models. The result showed that positive and negative attitude in learning English conversations, five types of realizations, and the reasons of the students realized their attitudes i.e. the language loyalty, language pride,  and awareness of language norms. It was concluded that the students’ attitude varied as to positive and negative ones and realized in numerous manners affected by several factors. Keywords: Discourse Markers, Students Interactions, Nonformal Education, Conversation


2018 ◽  
Vol 74 (6) ◽  
pp. 1258-1273 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keren Dali

Purpose In the context of increasing interdisciplinarity in academia and professional practice, the purpose of this paper is to focus on the contribution of information science (IS) to education and practice in social work (SW), specifically in the area of disabilities at the workplace. As a case in point, a work environment of academia and faculty members with disabilities and their managers are chosen. The paper also stands to improve interdisciplinary understanding between IS and SW. Design/methodology/approach Combining SW and IS perspectives and building off selective exposure, cognitive dissonance and uncertainty management theories, the paper looks at one of the root-causes of continuous workplace discrimination against and bullying of people with disabilities – information avoidance (IA). Findings The paper conceptualises discrimination and bullying as an inherently information problem, for which an SW solution could be proposed. Two types of information are noted to be avoided: information about disabilities and information about the effect of discrimination and bullying on employees with disabilities. The paper distinguishes between defensive and deliberate IA, each of which poses different challenges for social workers who are likely to intervene in the cases of bullying and discrimination in their capacity as workplace counsellors and advisors. Originality/value It is the first known paper that explores the intellectual and practice-based synergy between SW and IS in application to change-related interventions and preventative plans that counteract discrimination against people with disabilities at the workplace. It proposes creative solutions for intervention, including bibliotherapy. It also opens up a broader conversation on how critical the knowledge of IS is for social workers.


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