IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0260961.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Citizen journalism reduces the credibility deficit of authoritarian government in risk communication amid COVID-19 outbreaks

Author

Listed:
  • Greg Chih-Hsin Sheen
  • Hans H Tung
  • Wen-Chin Wu

Abstract

During the outbreak of an epidemic, the success in risk communications to make the public comply with disease preventive measures depends on the public’s trust in the government. In this study, we aim to understand how media audiences update their trust in the government during the COVID-19 outbreak depending on the information they received. We conducted an online survey experiment in February 2020 in Hong Kong (n = 1,016) in which respondents were randomly provided with a government press release and an endorsement either from an official or a non-official source. This study shows that the information from a non-official source enhances the credibility of official government messages. Our findings imply that dictators can actually “borrow credibility” from their citizen journalists and even nondemocratic leaders can make themselves more trustworthy to potential dissenters through citizen journalism. Allowing information flow from non-official sources can be a practical measure for governments to address the problem of a credibility deficit during a pandemic.

Suggested Citation

  • Greg Chih-Hsin Sheen & Hans H Tung & Wen-Chin Wu, 2021. "Citizen journalism reduces the credibility deficit of authoritarian government in risk communication amid COVID-19 outbreaks," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(12), pages 1-14, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0260961
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0260961
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0260961
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0260961&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0260961?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gabe Mythen, 2010. "Reframing risk? Citizen journalism and the transformation of news," Journal of Risk Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(1), pages 45-58, January.
    2. Nicholas Haas & Prabin B. Khadka, 2020. "If They Endorse It, I Can't Trust It: How Outgroup Leader Endorsements Undercut Public Support for Civil War Peace Settlements," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 64(4), pages 982-1000, October.
    3. Chun-Fang Chiang & Brian Knight, 2011. "Media Bias and Influence: Evidence from Newspaper Endorsements," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 78(3), pages 795-820.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bernhardt, Lea & Dewenter, Ralf & Thomas, Tobias, 2023. "Measuring partisan media bias in US newscasts from 2001 to 2012," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    2. Redlicki, B., 2017. "Spreading Lies," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 1747, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    3. Giovanni Facchini & Anna Maria Mayda & Riccardo Puglisi, 2017. "Illegal immigration and media exposure: evidence on individual attitudes," IZA Journal of Migration and Development, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 7(1), pages 1-36, December.
    4. Barrera, Oscar & Guriev, Sergei & Henry, Emeric & Zhuravskaya, Ekaterina, 2020. "Facts, alternative facts, and fact checking in times of post-truth politics," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 182(C).
    5. Leite Lopez de Leon Fernanda, 2013. "The Tuesday Advantage of Politicians Endorsed by American Newspapers," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 13(2), pages 865-886, October.
    6. Felix Chopra & Ingar K. Haaland & Christopher Roth, 2019. "Do People Value More Informative News?," CESifo Working Paper Series 8026, CESifo.
    7. Maja Adena & Ruben Enikolopov & Maria Petrova & Veronica Santarosa & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2015. "Radio and the Rise of The Nazis in Prewar Germany," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 130(4), pages 1885-1939.
    8. Horacio A. Larreguy & John Marshall & James M. Snyder, Jr., 2014. "Revealing Malfeasance: How Local Media Facilitates Electoral Sanctioning of Mayors in Mexico," NBER Working Papers 20697, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Donati, Dante, 2023. "Mobile Internet access and political outcomes: Evidence from South Africa," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).
    10. Bharati, Tushar & Jetter, Michael & Malik, Muhammad Nauman, 2024. "Types of communications technology and civil conflict," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 170(C).
    11. Michael Jetter, 2017. "Mediated Terrorism: US News and Al-Qaeda Attacks," CESifo Working Paper Series 6804, CESifo.
    12. Lin Hu & Anqi Li & Ilya Segal, 2019. "The Politics of Personalized News Aggregation," Papers 1910.11405, arXiv.org, revised Nov 2022.
    13. Miloš Fišar & Tommaso Reggiani & Fabio Sabatini & Jiří Špalek, 2020. "Media Bias and Tax Compliance: Experimental Evidence," MUNI ECON Working Papers 2020-01, Masaryk University, revised Feb 2023.
    14. Caroline Le Pennec & Vincent Pons, 2023. "How do Campaigns Shape Vote Choice? Multicountry Evidence from 62 Elections and 56 TV Debates," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 138(2), pages 703-767.
    15. Stefano Della Vigna & Ruben Enikolopov & Vera Mironova & Maria Petrova & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2014. "Cross-Border Media and Nationalism: Evidence from Serbian Radio in Croatia," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 6(3), pages 103-132, July.
    16. Jetter, Michael, 2019. "The inadvertent consequences of al-Qaeda news coverage," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 391-410.
    17. Ozerturk, Saltuk, 2022. "Media access, bias and public opinion," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 147(C).
    18. Miloš Fišar & Tommaso Reggiani & Fabio Sabatini & Jiří Špalek, 2022. "Media negativity bias and tax compliance: experimental evidence," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 29(5), pages 1160-1212, October.
    19. Miguel Fajardo-Steinhauser, 2023. "Peace Dividends: The Economic Effects of Colombia's Peace Agreement," Papers 2301.01843, arXiv.org, revised Dec 2024.
    20. Fernanda Leite Lopez Leon, 2016. "Endorse or Not to Endorse: Understanding the Determinants of Newspapers’ Likelihood of Making Political Recommendations," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 63(4), pages 357-376, September.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0260961. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.