College Students’ Attitude Towards the Media and COVID-19 Visual Misinformation: Focus Group Discussions and Thematic Analysis.

Theoretical Background and research questions/hypothesis:

This study examined the attitude of college students toward the media and COVID-19 visual misinformation. The theoretical framework for this study is the Risk Information Seeking and Processing Model (RISP). The Risk Information Seeking and Processing Model (RISP) “offers a framework to depict the key factors that predispose individuals to seek and process relevant risk information in a more systematic or thoughtful manner (Yang et al., 2014).” This model states that individuals actively seek and systematically process risk information based on the psychological need to gain more information (information insufficiency). People have different reasons for believing and sharing misinformation. A model used to explain this is the Heuristic-systematic model of information processing. This model states that people process information using two modes—heuristic processing and systematic processing. The heuristic processing requires less cognitive and mental effort. People adopt mental shortcuts to make quick decisions. In contrast, systematic processing is more analytic and processes information in-depth.

Research questions: 1. How did college students perceive the media during the COVID-19 pandemic? 2. How did college students navigate the overabundance of visual misinformation during the COVID-19 pandemic?

Methods:

Participants were recruited via purposive sampling, with the discussions recorded and transcribed. Five focus groups were conducted with college students between the ages of 23-27. The study was divided into three parts. In the first part, participants were asked questions about COVID-19 and their perception of the media environment as it involves seeking information on the virus, mask-wearing, social distancing and COVID-19 vaccines. In the second part, participants were shown COVID-19-related images with blurred text. In the third part, these participants were shown the same images, but with visible text. Questions were asked to gain insight into their attitude towards the media and visuals regarding COVID-19 misinformation.

Results:

Themes identified are:

Theme 1: Selective exposure to media

Theme 2: Fear appeal didn’t drive acceptance of public health mandate

Theme 3: Fake news sources identification based on platforms

Theme 4: Literacy level influences thinking

Conclusions:

The research findings showed that college students were overwhelmed by the overabundance of information in the media, which affected their trust level. They lacked trust in both mainstream and social media sources also because of the poor credibility of news sources. Participants trusted traditional media in comparison to COVID-19 messages on social media. COVID-19 messages on traditional and social media used fear appeal to drive individuals’ change in behavior, but participants didn’t change behaviors to fit the public health mandate because they could identify visual misinformation, even with blurred texts.

Implications for research and/or practice:

The implications of these findings and insights gained are useful to address the spread of visual health misinformation and the media’s role in combating this spread. Media outlets should invest in fact-checking teams and technologies that can verify the authenticity of images and videos. Media outlets should be transparent about their sources and methods of verification. Media outlets should take responsibility for their role in spreading visual misinformation. They should be proactive in correcting any false information they may have inadvertently spread.