The effects of misleading media reports about COVID-19 on Chinese tourists’ mental health: a perspective article

Zheng, Yi; Goh, Edmund; Wen, Jun

doi:10.1080/13032917.2020.1747208

Cited by 207 publications

(177 citation statements)

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“…The term “Chinese Virus” sparked a series of controversies; hashtags like #ChineseVirus and #WuhanVirus started trending among supporters of Donald Trump [ 7 - 9 ] on various online social networking platforms, with Twitter being the most prominent of them. Racial slurs and profane words against Asian communities have been visible on Twitter ever since [ 10 , 11 ]. In Italy, there have been several reports of anti-Chinese racism and discrimination.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Resurgence of Cyber Racism During the COVID-19 Pandemic and its Aftereffects: Analysis of Sentiments and Emotions in Tweets

Dubey¹

2020

JMIR Public Health Surveill

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Background With increasing numbers of patients with COVID-19 globally, China and the World Health Organization have been blamed by some for the spread of this disease. Consequently, instances of racism and hateful acts have been reported around the world. When US President Donald Trump used the term “Chinese Virus,” this issue gained momentum, and ethnic Asians are now being targeted. The online situation looks similar, with increases in hateful comments and posts. Objective The aim of this paper is to analyze the increasing instances of cyber racism during the COVID-19 pandemic, by assessing emotions and sentiments associated with tweets on Twitter. Methods In total, 16,000 tweets from April 11-16, 2020, were analyzed to determine their associated sentiments and emotions. Statistical analysis was carried out using R. Twitter API and the sentimentr package were used to collect tweets and then evaluate their sentiments, respectively. This research analyzed the emotions and sentiments associated with terms like “Chinese Virus,” “Wuhan Virus,” and “Chinese Corona Virus.” Results The results suggest that the majority of the analyzed tweets were of negative sentiment and carried emotions of fear, sadness, anger, and disgust. There was a high usage of slurs and profane words. In addition, terms like “China Lied People Died,” “Wuhan Health Organization,” “Kung Flu,” “China Must Pay,” and “CCP is Terrorist” were frequently used in these tweets. Conclusions This study provides insight into the rise in cyber racism seen on Twitter. Based on the findings, it can be concluded that a substantial number of users are tweeting with mostly negative sentiments toward ethnic Asians, China, and the World Health Organization.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Resurgence of Cyber Racism During the COVID-19 Pandemic and its Aftereffects: Analysis of Sentiments and Emotions in Tweets

Dubey¹

2020

JMIR Public Health Surveill

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“…Given the global impact of COVID-19 perhaps China should have conferred with the World Health Organization as to the "official" name, than create a name unilaterally. Zheng et al (2020) and Wen et al (2020) (there is a lot of overlap across both commentaries) relay reports of ethnically Chinese (or even those who appear Asian) being attacked in Australia, USA and Europe. There is no denying this.…”

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“…Both Wen et al (2020) and Zheng et al (2020) argue for more transparent media and unbiased journalism. While this is a great recommendation, it would have been useful to point out that the media is heavily censored in China.…”

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A rejoinder to misleading articles about misleading media coverage: a case of COVID-19

Pratt

2020

Anatolia

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Not surprisingly, with the outbreak of COVID 19 in the first half of 2020, scholars have raced to research or comment on how this global pandemic has impacted individuals, societies, and economies. Because of the global nature of the virus, international relations and politics have become important issues as the virus spread from country to country through international travel. Some of focus in dealing with the virus has been on the comparison of how nations deal with the virus as well as its origin and source. Hence, the way media in different nations have reported "facts" differs. While not new, post-truth politics and fake news have become a catch-cry of those who want to discredit those with different opinions (Gordon, 2018; Yee, 2017). This leads to the purpose of the rejoinder. The rejoinder responds to not one but two papers recently published in Anatolia: An International Journal of Tourism and Hospitality Research. These papers are Zheng et al. (2020) and Wen et al. (2020). In response to these articles, the issues raised in the rejoinder highlights the need to critically evaluate all points of view and censorship in the media. Several issues necessitate a more balanced approach than that of Zheng et al. (2020) and Wen et al. (2020), for the Middle Way is often seen as most harmonious (Chen, 2002). Zheng et al. (2020) state "the suspected source of COVID-19 is a virus found in wild animals". To scientists' best knowledge, this is true but does not tell the whole story. Leaving aside the conspiracy theories that COVID-19 was human-made (Calisher et al., 2020), it is not just that COVID-19 is found in wild animals. The virus "jumped" from bats (Shereen et al., 2020), possibly via pangolins (Zhang et al., 2020) through human consumption in Wuhan (Huang et al., 2020), which may have been at a wet market, although there is some conjecture over that (ABC News, 2020). This was omitted in the Zheng et al. (2020) commentary. This is important because it has strong policy implications. China's wildlife protection law encouraged the domestication and breeding of wildlife for human consumption inadvertently leading to SARS and now COVID-19 (CNBC, 2020). Following the outbreak of SARS, a ban on the trade of wildlife was imposed before being lifted some time later (The Wall Street Journal, 2020). Mixed messages via enacted laws followed in 2014. While commercial farming of certain species, including tigers was allowed, in contrast, China criminalized consumption of protected species with a maximum three-year jail term as punishment (AP News, 2020). With the outbreak of COVID-19, Chinese authorities have again banned the trade of wild animals. Zheng et al. (2020) argue that, by some media reports labelling COVID-19 as "Chinese virus" this may lead to Chinese citizens experiencing mental health issues if they are to travel internationally in the future. While both Zheng et al. (2020) and Wen et al. (2020) lament some racist headlines in the international media, for the most part the virus is not referred to as a "Chines...

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“…The coronavirus pandemic continues to reveal the economic dimension of the epidemic, and the extent of the virus's impact on the global, regional, national, and local economies is much broader and deeper than initial predictions (5). Consequently, the combination of these factors and many other psycho-social and even ideological variables and the widespread access of the world commu-nity to the media, especially its electronic and digital types, has produced a huge amount of data and information including those correctly and incorrectly published and republished (6). Accordingly, more than millions of messages, clips, and educational content related to COVID-19 are published on communication networks every day (7).…”

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confidence: 99%

Infodemic in Pandemic of COVID-19

et al. 2020

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The effects of misleading media reports about COVID-19 on Chinese tourists’ mental health: a perspective article

Cited by 207 publications

References 7 publications

The Resurgence of Cyber Racism During the COVID-19 Pandemic and its Aftereffects: Analysis of Sentiments and Emotions in Tweets

The Resurgence of Cyber Racism During the COVID-19 Pandemic and its Aftereffects: Analysis of Sentiments and Emotions in Tweets

A rejoinder to misleading articles about misleading media coverage: a case of COVID-19

Infodemic in Pandemic of COVID-19

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