scholarly journals Newspapers in Peril: Rationalizing the Economic Challenges of Novel Coronavirus (Covid-19) upon Regional Journalists in Hyderabad, Sindh, Pakistan

2021 ◽  
Vol VI (I) ◽  
pp. 96-107
Author(s):  
Farheen Qasim Nizamani ◽  
Muhammad Qasim Nizamani ◽  
Sikandar Hussain Soomro
Keyword(s):  
Health Knowledge ◽  
Health Hazard ◽  
Decisive Role ◽  
Newspaper Industry ◽  
Financial Difficulties ◽  
Sindh Province ◽  
Regional Newspapers ◽  
The Media ◽  
Social Environmental ◽  
Novel Coronavirus

Mass media play a decisive role in distributing health knowledge and awareness about health diseases. Covid-19 has been measured as the most dangerous health hazard of the 21st century that has constituted social, environmental and financial perils for humanity, including the media outlets. However, the Pakistani newspaper industry was already witnessing a decline in its readership and coronavirus has further deteriorated the situation for journalists working in regional newspapers. The methodological design using indepth interviews seeks to discover the financial difficulties faced by journalists employed in local or regional newspapers in Hyderabad city of Sindh province, Pakistan. The distress of unpaid salaries, financial security and paid leave were recognized as dominant elements that emerged during the present investigation as the extension to studies conducted concerning health communication. Therefore, this research suggests that government and business tycoons should financially collaborate with each other to consider challenges encountered by journalists for the survival of the newspaper industry in Pakistan.

scholarly journals The influence of mass media on Italian web users during COVID-19: an infodemiological analysis.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alessandro Rovetta ◽  
Lucia Castaldo
Keyword(s):  
Mass Media ◽  
Decisive Role ◽  
Scientific Basis ◽  
Online Information ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Web Searches ◽  
Information Giving ◽  
The Media ◽  
Novel Coronavirus ◽  
The Impact

Alongside the COVID-19 pandemic, the world has had to face a growing infodemic, which has caused severe damage to economic and health systems and has often compromised the effectiveness of infection containment regulations. Although this has spread mainly through social media, there are numerous occasions in which the mass media have shared dangerous information, giving resonance to statements without a scientific basis. For these reasons, infoveillance and infodemiology methods are increasingly exploited to monitor online information traffic. However, these tools have also been used to make epidemiological predictions. In particular, the “Google Trends” tool by GoogleTM has often been adopted by the scientific community to carry out this type of analysis. In this regard, the purpose of this paper is to estimate the impact of Italian mass media on users' web searches in order to understand the role of the media in the infodemic and in the interest of Italian web users towards COVID-19. In particular, our results suggest that the Italian mass media have played a decisive role both in the spread of the infodemic and in addressing netizens' web interest, favoring the adoption of terms unsuitable for identifying the novel coronavirus (COVID- 19 disease). Therefore, we suggest greater caution and attention by the directors of news channels and newspapers and greater control of the latter by government dissemination agencies.

GENDER AND SUSTAINABILITY: EVOLUTION OF DISCOURSE AND FEMINIST CRITIQUE OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 32-42
Author(s):  
YURI KOVALEV ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Decisive Role ◽  
Legal Aspects ◽  
Agenda 21 ◽  
Goals 2000 ◽  
Feminist Organizations ◽  
The Future ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Social Environmental

The purpose of this article is to analyze the stages of evolution of the UN social, environmental and gender policies and the peculiarities of their convergence into an integral concept of sustainable development, to assess the influence of feminist organizations on the direction and content of the concept of sustainable development, as well as criticism of «sustainability» and alternative development models proposed by feminist organizations and social movements, including the «Fridays for the Future» movement. The UN is the main international structure for shaping global social, environmental and gender policy. Over 75 years of the organization's activity, hundreds of documents have been adopted, dozens of conferences have been held in the field of eliminating social, gender and environmental inequalities. In 1992, the UN member states approved the «Agenda for the 21st century», in which social, gender and environmental aspects of development were combined into a holistic concept of sustainable development. Since that time, these political fields are considered in integrity and interconnection. International women's organizations have played a decisive role in integrating gender issues into the concept of sustainable development. Thanks to their activities, the legal aspects of enhancing gender equality are enshrined in the key UN documents on sustainable development - «Agenda 21» (1992), «Millennium Goals» (2000), «Implementation Plan» (2002), «The future we are want «(2012),» Sustainable Development Goals 2030 «(2015). At the same time, there are processes of the formation of an alternative gender discourse and feminist criticism of the official concept of sustainable development. International feminist movements and organizations have played a huge role in this. Currently, there are several feminist approaches to the study of the relationship between women and the environment: ecological-feminist, economic-ecological and post-structuralist. The most important area of activity for feminist organizations is the fight against global climate change. With the onset of the fourth wave of feminism in environmental protection, new trends and vivid leadership figures have emerged, and there has been a direct increase in women's presence in global climate policy. The most striking example of this trend is the climate movement «Fridays for the Future» (PRB), created by eco-activist G. Thunberg.

scholarly journals Understanding the Factors Influencing Patient E-Health Literacy in Online Health Communities (OHCs): A Social Cognitive Theory Perspective

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (14) ◽  
pp. 2455 ◽  
Author(s):  
Junjie Zhou ◽  
Tingting Fan
Keyword(s):  
Social Interaction ◽  
Health Literacy ◽  
Social Cognitive ◽  
Cognitive Theory ◽  
Health Knowledge ◽  
Online Health Communities ◽  
Factors Influencing ◽  
Health Communities ◽  
Social Environmental ◽  
Knowledge Seeking

Although online health communities (OHCs) are increasingly popular in public health promotion, few studies have explored the factors influencing patient e-health literacy in OHCs. This paper aims to address the above gap. Based on social cognitive theory, we identified one behavioral factor (i.e., health knowledge seeking) and one social environmental factor (i.e., social interaction ties) and proposed that both health knowledge seeking and social interaction ties directly influence patient e-health literacy; in addition, social interaction ties positively moderate the effect of health knowledge seeking on patient e-health literacy. We collected 333 valid data points and verified our three hypotheses. The empirical results provide two crucial findings. First, both health knowledge seeking and social interaction ties positively influence patient e-health literacy in OHCs. Second, social interaction ties positively moderate the effect of health knowledge seeking on patient e-health literacy. These findings firstly contribute to public health literature by exploring the mechanism of how different factors influence patient e-health literacy in OHCs and further contribute to e-health literacy literature by verifying the impact of social environmental factors.

The Watchdog Still Barks

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Beth Knobel
Keyword(s):  
The United States ◽  
Newspaper Industry ◽  
Investigative Reporting ◽  
Ownership Structures ◽  
Digital Era ◽  
The Press ◽  
The Media ◽  
The One ◽  
Important Form ◽  
Better Than

Perhaps no other function of a free press is as important as the watchdog role. It is easier for politicians to get away with abusing power, wasting public funds, and making poor decisions if the press is not shining its light with what is termed “accountability reporting.” This need has become especially clear as the American press has come under direct attack for carrying out its watchdog duties. This book presents a study of how this most important form of journalism came of age in the digital era at American newspapers. The book examines the front pages of nine newspapers, located across the United States, for clues on how papers addressed the watchdog role as the advent of the Internet transformed journalism. It shows how papers of varying sizes and ownership structures around the country marshaled resources for accountability reporting despite significant financial and technological challenges. Although the American newspaper industry contracted significantly during the 1990s and 2000s due to the digital transformation, the data collected in this book shows that the papers held fast to the watchdog role. The newspapers all endured budget and staff cuts during the 20 years studied as paid circulation and advertising dropped, but the amount of deep watchdog reporting on their front pages generally increased over this time. The book contains interviews with editors of the newspapers studied, who explain why they are staking their papers' futures on the one thing that American newspapers still do better than any other segment of the media—watchdog and investigative reporting.

scholarly journals Kyiv and Chernihiv Regional Newspapers as a Source of Strategies of the Authority Related to Involving Pupils as Executors of Holodomor Policy in 1932–1933s

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 117-123
Author(s):  
Ihor Yakubovskyi
Keyword(s):  
Regional Newspapers ◽  
The Media ◽  
The Village

The article aims to examine the regional media (Kyiv and Chernihiv cases) as a sources of the investigation of authorities’ strategies in 1932–1933s for the role of pupils of the village schools in the context of implementation of the Holodomor policy. The article is a unique research for the reflection of this problem in Kyiv and Chernihiv regional media of the Holodomor period. Also it is a first research attempt to portrait the specific features of the authorities’ strategies regarding pupils involvement in the Holodomor practices. Although the media in USSR have always been under authorities’ pressure and have always served them, the informative potential of the Kyiv and Chernihiv regional newspapers of 1932–1933 enabled to investigate the key problem related to the above-mentioned field of Holodomor. The newspaper’s articles about every day practices are based to examine of the authorities’ plans of involving the pupils into these practices. The number of such articles which were revealed and studied in the media from different regions convincingly argue that authority aspired to turn pupils into executors of Holodomor policy. This process was performed in parallel with the strategies aimed to the global sovietization of the children. The pupils in all parts of Kyiv and Chernihiv regions were used for an agitation of the farmers to carry out of plan that was not real, to provide credits for governments and of searching and expropriation of farmer’s grain. The pupil’s denunciation of people who have grain were tolerated and inspired.

scholarly journals Beneficial AI: the next battlefield

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 6-17
Author(s):  
Eugénio Oliveira
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
New Technology ◽  
Decisive Role ◽  
Science And Engineering ◽  
Human In The Loop ◽  
Giant Leap ◽  
The Media ◽  
Cautious Interpretation ◽  
Near Future ◽  
First World

When planting our human print in a new technology-driven world we should ask, remembering Neil Armstrong in 1969, “after many small steps for AI researchers, will it result in a giant leap in the unknown for mankind?” An “Artificial Intelligence-first” world is being preached all over the media by many responsible players in economic and scientific communities.This letter states our belief in AI potentialities, including its major and decisive role in computer science and engineering, while warning against the current hyping of its near future. Although quite excited by several recent interesting revelations about the future of AI, we here argue in favor of a more cautious interpretation of the current and future AI-based systems potential outreach.We also include some personal perspectives on simple remedies to preventing recognized possible dangers. We advocate a set of practices and principles that may prevent the development of AI-based systems prone to be misused.Accountable “Data curators”, appropriate Software Engineering specification methods, the inclusion, when needed, of the “human in the loop”, software agents with emotion-like states might be important factors leading to more secure AI-based systems.Moreover, to inseminate ART in Artificial Intelligence, ART standing for Accountability, Responsibility and Transparency, becomes also mandatory for trustworthy AI-based systems.This letter is an abbreviation of a more substantial article to be published in IJCA journal.

scholarly journals The role of race and scientific trust on support for COVID-19 social distancing measures in the United States

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (7) ◽  
pp. e0254127
Author(s):  
Sara Kazemian ◽  
Sam Fuller ◽  
Carlos Algara
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
Institutional Trust ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Social Distancing ◽  
The Media ◽  
Racial Lines ◽  
Novel Coronavirus

Pundits and academics across disciplines note that the human toll brought forth by the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic in the United States (U.S.) is fundamentally unequal for communities of color. Standing literature on public health posits that one of the chief predictors of racial disparity in health outcomes is a lack of institutional trust among minority communities. Furthermore, in our own county-level analysis from the U.S., we find that counties with higher percentages of Black and Hispanic residents have had vastly higher cumulative deaths from COVID-19. In light of this standing literature and our own analysis, it is critical to better understand how to mitigate or prevent these unequal outcomes for any future pandemic or public health emergency. Therefore, we assess the claim that raising institutional trust, primarily scientific trust, is key to mitigating these racial inequities. Leveraging a new, pre-pandemic measure of scientific trust, we find that trust in science, unlike trust in politicians or the media, significantly raises support for COVID-19 social distancing policies across racial lines. Our findings suggest that increasing scientific trust is essential to garnering support for public health policies that lessen the severity of the current, and potentially a future, pandemic.

scholarly journals The Influence of Mass Media on Italian Web Users During COVID-19: An Infodemiological Analysis

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alessandro Rovetta ◽  
Lucia Castaldo
Keyword(s):  
Mass Media ◽  
Decisive Role ◽  
Scientific Basis ◽  
Google Trends ◽  
Online Information ◽  
Information Giving ◽  
Search Volume ◽  
Novel Coronavirus ◽  
Relative Search Volume ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Alongside the COVID-19 pandemic, the world has had to face a growing infodemic, which has caused severe damage to economic and health systems and has often compromised the effectiveness of infection containment regulations. Although this has spread mainly through social media, there are numerous occasions in which the mass media have shared dangerous information, giving resonance to statements without a scientific basis. For these reasons, infoveillance and infodemiology methods are increasingly exploited to monitor online information traffic. The same tools have also been used to make epidemiological predictions. Among these, Google Trends - a service by GoogleTM that quantifies the web interest of users in the form of relative search volume - has often been adopted by the scientific community. In this regard, the purpose of this paper is to use Google Trends to estimate the impact of Italian mass media on users' web searches in order to understand the role of press and television channels in both the infodemic and the interest of Italian netizens on COVID-19. In conclusion, our results suggest that the Italian mass media have played a decisive role both in the spread of the infodemic and in addressing netizens' web interest, thus favoring the adoption of terms unsuitable for identifying the novel coronavirus (COVID- 19 disease). Therefore, it is highly advisable that the directors of news channels and newspapers be more cautious and government dissemination agencies exert more control over such news.

scholarly journals Which Are the Main Surface Disinfection Approaches at the Time of SARS-CoV-2?

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elena Ghedini ◽  
Marco Pizzolato ◽  
Lilia Longo ◽  
Federica Menegazzo ◽  
Danny Zanardo ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Health Hazard ◽  
Added Value ◽  
World Health ◽  
Personal Hygiene ◽  
Respiratory Pathogens ◽  
Potential Health ◽  
Surface Disinfection ◽  
Critical Issues ◽  
Novel Coronavirus ◽  
Health Organization

Among many guidelines issued by the World Health Organization to prevent contagion from novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2), disinfection of animate and inanimate surfaces has emerged as a key issue. One effective approach to prevent its propagation can be achieved by disinfecting air, skin, or surfaces. A thorough and rational application of an Environmental Protection Agent for disinfection of surfaces, as well as a good personal hygiene, including cleaning hands with appropriate products (e.g., 60–90% alcohol-based product) should minimize transmission of viral respiratory pathogens such as SARS-CoV-2. Critical issues, associated with the potential health hazard of chemical disinfectants and the ineffective duration of most of the treatments, have fostered the introduction of innovative and alternative disinfection approaches. The present review aims to provide an outline of methods currently used for inanimate surface disinfection with a look to the future and a focus on the development of innovative and effective disinfection approaches (e.g., metal nanoparticles, photocatalysis, self-cleaning, and self-disinfection) with particular focus on SARS-CoV-2. The research reviews are, usually, focused on a specific category of disinfection methods, and therefore they are limited. On the contrary, a panoramic review with a wider focus, as the one here proposed, can be an added value for operators in the sector and generally for the scientific community.

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