News Framing and Preference-Based Reinforcement: Evidence from a Real Framing Environment During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

COVID-19 is a news issue that can be covered from many different angles. When reporting, journalists have to select, accentuate, or exclude particular aspects, which, in turn, may evoke a specific, and possibly constricted, perspective in viewers, a phenomenon termed the news-framing effect. Guided by the reinforcing spiral framework, we conducted a multi-study project that investigated the news-framing effect's underlying mechanism by studying the dynamic of self-reinforcing effects. Grounded in a real-life framing environment observed during the pandemic and systematically assessed via a content analysis (study 1) and survey (study 2), we offer supporting evidence for a preference-based reinforcement model by utilizing a combination of the selective exposure (i.e., self-selected exposure) and causal effects (i.e., forced exposure) paradigms within one randomized controlled study (study 3). Self-selection of news content by viewers was a necessary precondition for frame-consistent (reinforcement) effects. Forced exposure did not elicit causal effects in a frame-consistent direction.

Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Pandemic and Stock Price Crashes: A Cross-National Correlational Approach.

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic is a serious threat to public health and the economy. Importantly, there was a stock price crash on Monday, March 9, 2020, followed by a similar crash one week later. Leading global indices substantially dropped. Based on previous research indicating that the news media may elicit effects on stock prices, we hypothesized that the amount of news coverage about COVID-19 within a given country would predict the size of the stock price drop in that country. Using data for N = 58 nations from five continents, we observed average stock price drops of 6.57% (week 1) and 6.43% (week 2). Using a cross-national correlational approach, we found a positive relationship between the amount of news coverage about COVID-19 and the extent of the stock price drop. Actual severity within a given country (indicated by the number of confirmed cases and deaths, based on data provided by the World Health Organization) and public attention (indicated by COVID-19-related Internet search engine volume) did not predict the extent of the stock price drop in multivariate analyses. Correlational evidence is consistent with the idea that intensive media reporting on a threatening pandemic with uncertain negative consequences on health, social life, and the economy may provoke substantial reactions in the market, with as yet unknown indirect effects on public health. However, the causal order of media attention and stock price drops should be assessed with caution.

COVID-19 pandemic, government responses, and public mental health: Investigating consequences through crisis hotline calls in two countries.

RATIONALE: The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic is an immense global health threat that has invoked unheard-of containment measures in numerous countries to reduce the number of new infections. OBJECTIVE: The sequential introduction of severe measures, intentionally aiming at reducing the number of new infections, also imposes sharp restrictions on populations with potentially unintended, detrimental effects on public mental health. METHOD: We used observational data reflecting the number of phone calls made to national crisis hotlines in Austria and Germany during the COVID-19 pandemic (January 2020-April 2020) to investigate the impact of government restrictions as well as their later revocations on public mental health. Importantly, both countries have comparable health care systems, are similar in their political and socio-economic idiosyncrasies, and took similar restrictive government measures in order to contain COVID-19-but implemented them at different points in time. RESULTS: Analysis indicated that the number of crisis hotline calls increased in both countries. This increase seemed to occur at around the same time as the implementation of restrictive governmental responses. Importantly, the revocation of these governmental restrictions (i.e., re-opening the economy, allowing more social contact) seemed to occur at around the same time as the decrease in the number of calls. CONCLUSIONS: The present study supports the notion that the implementation of severe measures affects public mental health. However, the negative mental health effects of COVID-19 may be reduced if severe governmental restrictions are kept in place as briefly as possible.