Truth on Demand

Influences on How Journalists in Italy, Spain, and Bulgaria Responded to Covid-19 Misinformation and Disinformation

Bibliographic Data

ID12909012
AuthorsDarina Sarelska (0009-0000-6610-293X, American University in Bulgaria, corresponding author), Joy Jenkins (University of Tennessee at Knoxville)
Year2022
Volume17
Issue10
Pages2178-2196
Publication date2022-12-07
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournalism Practice (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1751-2786 • E-ISSN: 1751-2794
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/17512786.2022.2153075
OpenAlexW4311843437
LanguageEN
Citations received9
References cited45

The COVID-19 pandemic significantly disrupted fundamental social institutions, and the media was no exception. Journalists were challenged to report on an outbreak of pressing health-related information, complicated by malinformation erupting in a time of enhanced public demand for reliable facts. This study uses in-depth interviews with journalists at leading news outlets- both public service and commercial, in Italy, Spain, and Bulgaria (N = 24) to examine how they responded to misinformation and disinformation arising in the initial months of the pandemic. Using the frameworks of journalistic epistemology and the hierarchy-of-influences model, we explored the norms, routines, and practices guiding journalists’ truth claims as well as the individual, routine, organizational, and social-systems influences shaping their decision-making. We found three common narratives of conspiracy theories consistent across different media systems: “big state” concerns, evident in people questioning the very existence of the coronavirus as a pretense for globally enforced state supervision on individual freedoms; “big pharma,” or people blaming the lack of a cure for COVID-19 on pharmaceutical companies pushing for vaccinations; and “big fear” attitude - falsehoods about vaccines potentially causing more harm than good, including changing people’s DNA. We also discuss three common strategies journalists used to respond to COVID-misinformation: deflecting, countering and false equivalency approach

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19 · Disinformation · Harm · Misinformation · Narrative · Pandemic · Political science · Public relations · Social media · Sociology · Law · Media Studies and Communication · Medicine · Misinformation and Its Impacts · Public Relations and Crisis Communication

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