Research Publication Roundup: April 2022
A vibrant and collaborative interdisciplinary research culture at the UNC Hussman School of Journalism and Media creates new knowledge, advances scholarship and helps reinvent media.
Ph.D. candidate Jacob Thompson will attend the National Conference on Race and Ethnicity in Higher Education in June, where he will present findings from his dissertation about how diversity, equity, and inclusion staff at colleges and universities develop their communication strategies. Noel Castro Fernandez will present his master's thesis at the North Carolina Digital Humanities Institute in April, while fellow master's student Walker Winslow will present work about anti-war sentiment in Russia in June. More details on these presentations are listed below, along with a list of other recently published or presented scholarship by UNC Hussman faculty and students.
RECENT PUBLICATIONS
In this article, the authors recruited a national probability sample of 623 U.S. adolescents (ages 13-17) to identify the most compelling themes for vaping warnings among adolescents. Participants saw one of five message themes about the dangerous health effects of vaping: (1) chemical harms, (2) lung harms, (3) COVID-19 harms, (4) nicotine addiction or (5) vape litter (the control message). Adolescent participants perceived the chemical, lung and COVID-19 harms warning messages as significantly more effective than the other two messages. These same three warning messages (chemical, lung and COVID-19 harms) also elicited greater negative affect. Thus, future warning messages about the harms of vaping directed toward adolescents should focus on the chemical, lung and COVID-19 harms, as opposed to nicotine addiction.
Integrating motivated reasoning theory, attribution theory and construal level theory, this study examined the factors associated with Americans’ attribution of responsibility to the Chinese government during the COVID-19 pandemic. The authors surveyed a nationally representative sample of Americans ages 18-86. Results of the survey demonstrated that political conservatism was positively associated with the locality and accountability of responsibility attribution. In other words, participants who identified as more conservative attributed more responsibility for the pandemic to China. The perceived severity and construal level of attribution related to the locality of attribution, such that those who perceived higher severity and a lower construal level (i.e., more specific attribution) perceived higher internal locality. In other words, how severe participants perceived the pandemic to be affected whether they thought the pandemic was caused by issues within the government of China; furthermore, participants who described the origins of the pandemic as more abstract (a higher construal level of attribution) were less likely to attribute responsibility to the Chinese government. The findings suggest the need to understand individuals’ motivated reasoning in responsibility attribution during crises.
Zhao, X., Xu, S., & Austin, L. L. (2022). Medium and source convergence in crisis information acquisition: Patterns, antecedents, and outcomes. New Media & Society. Advance online publication.
To understand how individuals navigate the complex, dynamic and bewildering media information environment, the authors proposed a new convergence framework. Theorizing individuals’ acquisition of information from distinct sources on multiple mediums, along with its antecedents and consequences, this study is among the first to test this convergence framework. Using a national sample during the COVID-19 pandemic, results revealed four convergence patterns: Deliberative Actives, Digital Utilitarians, Traditionalists and Nonactives. Results also revealed that individuals’ information verification tendency, perceived medium anonymity and trust in alternative sources were associated with distinct patterns of convergence, which led to different risk perceptions. Future research should explore different forms of convergence and additional antecedents and outcomes of convergence.
CONFERENCES
North Carolina Digital Humanities Institute
April 21 - 22, 2022 | Virtual
Castro Fernandez, N. (2022, April). Notes from the Silicon Age: An interactive exploration on the meaning(s) of nature. Paper to be presented at the North Carolina Digital Humanities Institute. Virtual.
National Conference on Race and Ethnicity in Higher Education
May 31 – June 4, 2022 | Portland, OR, US
Thompson, J. (2022, June). NCORE Student Scholar. National Conference on Race and Ethnicity in Higher Education. Portland, OR.
Communication, Conflict, and Peace
June 27, 2022 | Liverpool Hope University, Liverpool, UK
Winslow, W. (2022, June). Story swapping and anti-war sentiment in the Russian Federation. Paper to be presented at the Liverpool Hope University Communication, Conflict, and Peace Conference. Liverpool, UK.