Health and New Media Research Institute, Hallym University, Chuncheon, South Korea.
Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information Nanyang, Technological University, Singapore.
J Health Commun. 2021 Oct 3;26(10):728-741. doi: 10.1080/10810730.2021.1999348. Epub 2021 Nov 14.
This study examines the emotional mechanisms of how public trust in the governments' actions to address the COVID-19 pandemic shapes individuals' risk information-seeking and avoidance. To make cross-cultural comparisons, we conducted a multi-country survey early in the pandemic in South Korea, the United States (US) and Singapore. The results suggest that trust was negatively related to fear, anger, sadness and anxiety, and positively related to hope. These emotions were significant mediators of the effect of trust on information seeking and avoidance, except for anger on avoidance. Importantly, the indirect effects of trust in government varied by country. Fear was a stronger mediator between trust and information seeking in South Korea than in the US. In contrast, sadness and anger played more prominent mediating roles in Singapore than in South Korea. This study offers theoretical insights into better understanding the roles of discrete emotions in forming information behaviors. The findings of this study also inform communication strategies that seek to navigate trust in managing pandemics that impact multiple nations.
本研究考察了公众对政府应对 COVID-19 大流行的行动的信任如何影响个人风险信息寻求和回避的情绪机制。为了进行跨文化比较，我们在大流行早期在韩国、美国（US）和新加坡进行了一项多国调查。结果表明，信任与恐惧、愤怒、悲伤和焦虑呈负相关，与希望呈正相关。这些情绪是信任对信息寻求和回避的影响的重要中介因素，除了回避中的愤怒。重要的是，政府信任的间接效应因国家而异。在韩国，恐惧在信任和信息寻求之间的中介作用强于美国。相比之下，悲伤和愤怒在新加坡的中介作用比在韩国更为突出。本研究为更好地理解离散情绪在形成信息行为中的作用提供了理论见解。本研究的结果还为旨在利用信任管理影响多个国家的大流行的沟通策略提供了信息。
