Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, Nanyang Technological University.
Health Commun. 2024 Apr;39(2):352-362. doi: 10.1080/10410236.2023.2165750. Epub 2023 Jan 10.
News-finds-me (NFM) perception is a belief that, in the era of social media, individuals can remain adequately well-informed about current events even if they do not actively seek news. While it has been examined in the context of general and political news, NFM perception has not been explored in the context of other genres of news. Through an online survey involving 1,001 Singaporeans, with the Planned Risk Information Seeking Model, this study examines how NFM perception is related to information seeking and COVID-19 knowledge. An issue-specific NFM perception was also proposed and tested in order to determine whether NFM perception and its associated effects differ when operationalized as general news exposure or issue-specific news relating to COVID-19. The negative relationship between general NFM perception and knowledge and the mediating role of information seeking on social media in this relationship are detected. It is also found that when the NFM perception is issue-specific (i.e. COVID-NFM perception), information insufficiency and intentions of information seeking on social media fully mediated the relationship between NFM perception and knowledge. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
新闻发现我（NFM）感知是一种信念，即在社交媒体时代，即使个人不主动寻求新闻，他们也可以充分了解当前事件。虽然已经在一般新闻和政治新闻的背景下对其进行了研究，但 NFM 感知在其他新闻体裁的背景下尚未得到探索。本研究通过一项涉及 1001 名新加坡人的在线调查，运用计划风险信息寻求模型，探讨了 NFM 感知与信息寻求和 COVID-19 知识之间的关系。还提出并测试了一个特定于问题的 NFM 感知，以确定当将 NFM 感知及其相关影响操作化为一般新闻报道或与 COVID-19 相关的特定问题新闻时，NFM 感知及其相关影响是否存在差异。检测到一般 NFM 感知与知识之间的负相关关系，以及信息寻求在这种关系中的社交媒体中介作用。还发现，当 NFM 感知是特定于问题的（即 COVID-NFM 感知）时，信息不足和社交媒体上的信息寻求意图完全中介了 NFM 感知和知识之间的关系。讨论了理论和实践意义。
