Unintentional Encounters
Unraveling the Relationships Between Incidental News Exposure, Cognitive Elaboration, Digital Affordances, and Factual Knowledge
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21616699 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Yan Su (0000-0002-1546-2799, Tarleton State University), Chen Luo (0000-0002-9736-0533, Wuhan University, corresponding author), Porismita Borah (0000-0002-1140-4233, Washington State University) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Pages | 1-12 |
| Publication date | 2025-12-08 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Health Communication (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1041-0236 • E-ISSN: 1532-7027 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/10410236.2025.2598647 |
| PMID | 41362046 |
| OpenAlex | W4417145981 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 63 |
In an increasingly saturated news environment, individuals often encounter information through incidental news exposure (INE). Drawing upon a refined cognitive mediation model, this study employs a two-wave panel survey to examine the relationship between social media INE and factual knowledge about COVID-19. While INE was not directly associated with factual knowledge, it demonstrated a positive indirect association with it through cognitive elaboration. This mediated relationship was further moderated by users' engagement with digital affordances: greater use of social media affordances strengthened the indirect pathway from INE to knowledge. These findings illuminate the complex interplay among digital affordances, incidental exposure, and cognitive processing in shaping health learning
Affordance · Cognition · Digital media · Mediation · Social cognition · Social cognitive theory · Social media · Educational Strategies and Epistemologies · Impact of Technology on Adolescents · Misinformation and Its Impacts
The Personal Is the Political? What Do WhatsApp Users Share and How It Matters for News Knowledge, Polarization and Participation in Chile
Accidentally Informed
The Cognitive Mediation Model
The social media political participation model
Social media as a catalyst for online deliberation? Exploring the affordances of Facebook and YouTube for political expression
News Information Processing as Mediator of the Relationship between Motivations and Political Knowledge
Ambient Awareness and Knowledge Acquisition
The Importance of ‘Likes’
Moving beyond “Just the Facts”
The Issue Takes It All?
Appraisal Considered as a Process of Multilevel Sequential Checking
Examining the Dimensions of Cancer-Related Information Seeking and Scanning Behavior
The Cognitive Mediation Model of Learning From the News
Stumbling upon news on the Internet
Cancer Information Scanning and Seeking Behavior is Associated with Knowledge, Lifestyle Choices, and Screening
Cutoff criteria for fit indexes in covariance structure analysis
Evaluating Structural Equation Models with Unobservable Variables and Measurement Error
Effects of the news finds me perception on algorithmic news attitudes and social media political homophily
Just a Glance, or More? Pathways from Counter-Attitudinal Incidental Exposure to Attitude (De)Polarization Through Response Behaviors and Cognitive Elaboration
Scanning vs. Thorough Processing the News
News Engagement
“Yes, I Saw It – But Didn’t Read It…” A Cross-Country Study, Exploring Relationships between Incidental News Exposure and News Use across Platforms
Processing news on social media. The political incidental news exposure model (Pine)
Why People Who Know Less Think They Know about Covid-19
Linking Pathways from Perceived Absolute and Comparative Risk to Colorectal Cancer Screening Intention
Understanding the Effects of News-Finds-Me Perception on Health Knowledge and Information Seeking During Public Health Crises
Who is your Fitspiration? An Exploration of Strong and Weak Ties with Emotions, Body Satisfaction, and the Theory of Planned Behavior
Beyond Scanning and Seeking
Skip the checking step
How do people learn about politics when inadvertently exposed to news? Incidental news paradoxical Direct and indirect effects on political knowledge
Incidental news exposure and Covid-19 misperceptions
Seeing political information online incidentally. Effects of first- and second-level incidental exposure on democratic outcomes
Platform-dependent effects of incidental exposure to political news on political knowledge and political participation
Knowledge Acquisition Following Exposure to Cancer News Articles
Bias in Cross-Sectional Analyses of Longitudinal Mediation
Incidental news exposure in a digital media environment
Skipping politics
Peripheral elaboration model
Antecedents of Incidental News Exposure
The Role of Engagement in Learning From Active and Incidental News Exposure on Social Media
Comparing Theories of Media Learning
Political Journalists’ Normalization of Twitter
Is News Surveillance Related to Cancer Knowledge in Underserved Adults? Testing Three Versions of the Cognitive Mediation Model
The Contradictory Influence of Social Media Affordances on Online Communal Knowledge Sharing
Effects of the News-Finds-Me Perception in Communication
Antecedents of intentional and incidental exposure modes on social media and consequences for political participation
Three Approaches to Estimate Latent Interaction Effects
Conceptualizing different forms of news processing following incidental news contact
Incidental News Exposure on Social Media
Comparing to Prepare
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |