Information Seeking and Processing in the Context of Vaccine Scandals

Abstract

This study employs the risk information seeking and processing (RISP) model to examine social cognitive variables that motivate active information seeking and systematic processing. The research context is the recent childhood vaccine scandals in China. As a novel contribution to the RISP literature, a significant interaction between relevant channel beliefs and perceived information gathering capacity is unveiled. This result suggests that both information quality and accessibility to information channels influence information seeking, which is an important finding with theoretical and practical implications for other science communication issues.

Systematic Processing of COVID-19 Information: Relevant Channel Beliefs and Perceived Information Gathering Capacity as Moderators

“…Respondents indicated their perception of others’ expectations about their own information level about COVID-19. Consistent with previous research (Yang & Liu, 2021), we used three items to measure informational subjective norms.…”

“…However, only one study to date has examined this moderation effect on systematic processing (Yang & Liu, 2021), and it failed to find any significant result. It is possible that the research context of that study, which was the vaccine scandals in China, was not conducive to identifying this interaction effect.…”

“…Consistent with previous research (Yang & Liu, 2021), we used three items to measure informational subjective norms.…”

“…Relevant Channel Beliefs. Six items adopted from previous research (Griffin et al, 2002;Yang & Liu, 2021) were used to measure respondents' beliefs about whether COVID-19 information in traditional media and social media was accurate and consistent. 2 Perceived Information Gathering Capacity.…”

Explaining education-based difference in systematic processing of COVID-19 information: Insights into global recovery from infodemic

“…Z. Yang & Liu, 2021 ). The impression motivation characterizes another key variable in the RISP model, namely, informational subjective norms , which motivate people to see systematic processing as a socially desirable behavior to cope with the infodemic (J.…”