In April 2021, the use of the Johnson & Johnson COVID‐19 vaccine was paused to investigate whether it had caused serious blood clots to a small number of women (six out of 6.8 million Americans who ...had been administered that vaccine). As these events were unfolding, we surveyed a sample of Americans (N = 625) to assess their reactions to this news, whether they supported the pausing of the vaccine, and potential psychological factors underlying their decision. In addition, we employed automated text analyses as a supporting method to more classical quantitative measures. Results showed that political ideology influenced the support for the pausing of the vaccine; liberals were more likely to oppose it than conservatives. In addition, the effect of political ideology was mediated by the difference between perceived benefit and risk and the language style used to produce reasons in support (or against) the decision to pause the vaccine. Liberals perceived the benefit of vaccines higher than the risk, used a more analytic language style when stating their reasons, and had a more positive attitude toward the vaccine. We discuss the implications of our findings considering vaccine hesitancy and risk perception during the COVID‐19 pandemic.
Virtuous violence from the war room to death row Slovic, Paul; Mertz, C. K.; Markowitz, David M. ...
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS,
08/2020, Letnik:
117, Številka:
34
Journal Article
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How likely is it that someone would approve of using a nuclear weapon to kill millions of enemy civilians in the hope of ending a ground war that threatens thousands of American troops? Ask them how ...they feel about prosecuting immigrants, banning abortion, supporting the death penalty, and protecting gun rights and you will know. This is the finding from two national surveys of Democrats and Republicans that measured support for punitive regulations and policies across these four seemingly unrelated issues, and a fifth, using nuclear weapons against enemy civilians (in survey 1) or approving of disproportionate killing with conventional weapons (in survey 2). Those who support these various policies that threaten harm to many people tend to believe that the victims are blameworthy and it is ethical to take actions or policies that might harm them. This lends support to the provocative notion of “virtuous violence” put forth by Fiske and Rai A. P. Fiske, T. S. Rai, Virtuous Violence: Hurting and Killing to Create, Sustain, End, and Honor Social Relationships (2014), who assert that people commit violence because they believe it is the morally right thing to do. The common thread of punitiveness underlying and connecting these issues needs to be recognized, understood, and confronted by any society that professes to value fundamental human rights and wishes to prevent important decisions from being affected by irrelevant and harmful sociocultural and political biases.
An analysis of Academy Awards acceptance speeches revealed that social status is indicated through pronouns. Speeches from high status movie directors contained fewer self-references than relatively ...low status actors. Directors also communicated analytically compared with actors, who told stories and communicated narratively. A post hoc analysis revealed that unexpected award winners communicated more positively than those who were expected to win. The analyses emphasize the importance of replications in the social sciences and extending social and psychological phenomena to new settings.
This article uses a multitheoretical approach to investigate the relationship between language use and opinion expression on Yelp. Using review metadata (e.g., star rating) to observe variation in ...reviewer feelings and motivations, we test for the strength of different message design logics: expressive logics, where language reflects a reviewer’s underlying opinion, and rhetorical logics, where language reflects a reviewer’s desire to make his or her opinion credible and acceptable to their audience. Results suggest that emotional language is motivated by expression as higher rated businesses are reviewed with more positive and fewer negative emotion terms. Rhetorical logics are associated with the use of abstract and self-focused language, with analysis suggesting this may result from the reviewer’s decision to write either narratively or formally.
Abstract
Researchers often focus on the benefits of adopting open science, yet questions remain whether the general public, as well as academics, value and trust studies consistent with open science ...compared to studies without open science. In three preregistered experiments (total N = 2,691), we find that the general public perceived open science research and researchers as more credible and trustworthy than non-open science counterparts (Studies 1 and 2). We also explored if open science practices compensated for negative perceptions of privately-funded research versus publicly-funded research (Study 2), although the evidence did not support this hypothesis. Finally, Study 3 examined how communication scholars perceive researchers and their work as a function of open science adoption, along with publication outlet (e.g., high-prestige vs. low-prestige journals). We observed open science research was perceived more favorably than non-open science research by academics. We discuss implications for the open science movement and public trust in science.
Abstract
A significant paradigm shift is underway in communication research as open science practices (e.g., preregistration, open materials) are becoming more prevalent. The current work identified ...how much the field has embraced such practices and evaluated their impact on authors (e.g., citation rates). We collected 10,517 papers across 26 journals from 2010 to 2020, observing that 5.1% of papers used or mentioned open science practices. Communication research has seen the rate of nonsignificant p-values (p > .055) increasing with the adoption of open science over time, but p-values just below p < .05 have not reduced with open science adoption. Open science adoption was unrelated to citation rate at the article level; however, it was inversely related to the journals’ h-index. Our results suggest communication organizations and scholars have important work ahead to make open science more mainstream. We close with suggestions to increase open science adoption for the field at large.
Communities often unite during a crisis, though some cope by ascribing blame or stigmas to those who might be linked to distressing life events. In a preregistered two-wave survey, we evaluated the ...dehumanization of Asians and Asian Americans during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our first wave (March 26-April 2, 2020;
= 917) revealed dehumanization was prevalent, between 6.1% and 39% of our sample depending on measurement. Compared to non-dehumanizers, people who dehumanized also perceived the virus as less risky to human health and caused less severe consequences for infected people. They were more likely to be ideologically Conservative and believe in conspiracy theories about the virus. We largely replicated the results 1 month later in our second wave (May 6-May 13, 2020;
= 723). Together, many Americans dehumanize Asians and Asian Americans during the COVID-19 pandemic with related perceptions that the virus is less problematic. Implications and applications for dehumanization theory are discussed.
While a consumer revolution in virtual reality (VR) has piqued the interest of many fields, industries, and professions, it is unclear when, how, and to what degree the technology can elicit empathy. ...To better understand how the relationship between VR and empathy is communicated and defined, we performed qualitative and quantitative thematic analyses on popular (N = 640) and academic articles (N = 53) that included both terms. Findings revealed empathy is an aspirational term for journalists and researchers to showcase the potential of immersive media for prosocial change. Writers in both corpora suggested that empathetic experiences could lead to prosocial action through VR, but do not consistently define or measure empathy, given the inherent complexities surrounding the term. Drawing on seminal research in the field, we conclude with a definition of empathy related to immersive media.
This project analyzed the impact of a 2.5-day science training boot camp for political reporters on their use of scientific sources in published reporting. Results showed that immediately following ...the boot camp, most survey respondents indicated they would try to incorporate more scientific material into future stories. We used both automated text analysis and human-coded analysis to examine if actual changes in reporting behavior occurred. Automated text analysis revealed that while journalists did not use more explanatory language overall in the 6 months following the training, they wrote with greater certainty and less tentativeness in their published articles compared to before the training. The more targeted content analysis of articles revealed that journalists had modest increases for including scientific material overall, and peer-reviewed studies and scientists' quotes in particular. We discuss the implications of these findings for science training, journalism, and reporting.
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