ABSTRACT
The COVID-19 pandemic and the climate crisis are polarizing people's opinions worldwide, particularly with regard to restrictive policy measures. We examine the effects of social media use and personal concerns on opinions toward selected COVID-19 and environmental measures, and whether public opinion toward the two crises shows similar polarization patterns. The data is derived from an online survey conducted in German-speaking countries in the summer of 2020. Our analyses show that opinions toward COVID-19 measures are more polarized than toward environmental measures, and that personal concerns play a far greater role than social media use in shaping opinions toward policy measures for both crises. Only few platforms show significant and divergent effects, which we attribute to their different characteristics and potentials for the emergence of filter bubbles and echo chambers. We also observe a generational effect, suggesting that older individuals are more likely to support COVID-19 measures, while younger generations tend to do so for environmental measures. Furthermore, we find an unexpectedly high number of people who are completely opposed to all policy measures for both crises, again mainly due to personal concerns and attitudes. The results are discussed in the context of the time period in which the survey was conducted, as well as in relation to current developments, and from the perspective of the free-rider problem as a possible explanation for the one-sided polarization observed. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Innovation: The European Journal of Social Sciences is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)
ABSTRACT
Research on combining social survey responses and social media posts has shown that the willingness to share social media accounts in surveys depends on the mode of the survey and certain socio-demographics of the respondents. We add new insights to this research by demonstrating that the willingness to share their Facebook and Twitter accounts also depends on the respondents' opinions on specific topics. Furthermore, we extend previous research by actually accessing their social media accounts and checking whether survey responses and tweets are coherent. Our analyses indicate that survey respondents who are willing to share their social media accounts hold more positive attitudes toward COVID-19 measures. The same pattern holds true when comparing their sentiments to a larger Twitter collection. Our results highlight another source of sampling bias when combining survey and social media data: a bias due to specific views, which might be related to social desirability.
ABSTRACT
Polarization of public opinion is a major issue for societies, as high levels can promote adverse effects such as hostility. The present paper focuses on the polarization of opinions regarding COVID-19 prevention measures in survey data and on Twitter in the German-speaking regions of Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. The level of polarization is measured by dispersion and bimodality in the opinions based on the sentiment in Twitter data and the agreement in the survey data. Our paper, however, goes beyond existing research as we consider data from both sources separately and comparatively. For this purpose, we matched individuals? survey responses and tweets for those respondents who shared their Twitter account information. The analyses show that vaccination is more polarizing compared to mask wearing and contact tracing in both sources, that polarization of opinions is more pronounced in the survey data compared to the Twitter data, but also that individuals? opinions about the COVID-19 measures are consistent in both sources. We believe our findings will provide valuable insights for integrating survey data and Twitter data to investigate opinion polarization.
ABSTRACT
Previous analyses of environmentally conscious intentions showed that the willingness to sacrifice for the environment decreased during the COVID-19 crisis in Austria. There is a large body of empirical research and theoretical models dealing with the explanation of environmental behavior, but these explanations have always been considered in the context of a pandemic-free society. The aim of this research note is therefore to consider the willingness to sacrifice in a crisis period. The data used for the analyses is the Austrian part of the international ‘Values in Crisis’ survey. For this purpose, more than 2000 individuals were surveyed online about their values, social orientations and their current life situation during the first COVID-19 wave (May 2020). Blockwise regression models are used to examine the influence of crisis perceptions, environmental attitudes and values on the willingness to sacrifice for the environment. The analyses show a relatively strong influence of environmental attitudes and values, but also additional effects of concerns about the COVID-19 crisis and especially its economic impact.
ABSTRACT
Previous analyses of environmentally conscious intentions showed that the willingness to sacrifice for the environment decreased during the COVID-19 crisis in Austria. There is a large body of empirical research and theoretical models dealing with the explanation of environmental behavior, but these explanations have always been considered in the context of a pandemic-free society. The aim of this research note is therefore to consider the willingness to sacrifice in a crisis period. The data used for the analyses is the Austrian part of the international 'Values in Crisis' survey. For this purpose, more than 2000 individuals were surveyed online about their values, social orientations and their current life situation during the first COVID-19 wave (May 2020). Blockwise regression models are used to examine the influence of crisis perceptions, environmental attitudes and values on the willingness to sacrifice for the environment. The analyses show a relatively strong influence of environmental attitudes and values, but also additional effects of concerns about the COVID-19 crisis and especially its economic impact.