79 / 2024-04-19 12:13:52

Signal Transmission and Public Emotional Resonance: How do the signal characteristics of disaster information on social media affect public sentiment and information behavior?

Social media/Public sentiment/Signaling theory/Public information behavior

Analyzing the crucial factors that influence the effective dissemination of disaster-related information can contribute to disaster management. Based on signaling theory, this study examines the impact of the source of information, location, amount of information, and information appeals on public sentiment and public information behavior regarding disaster-related information. Furthermore, it analyzes how public sentiment influences public information behavior. Through the Weibo dataset of the Beijing flood, we discovered that all of these factors influence public sentiment and public information behavior. Our results support the negativity bias theory, indicating that the public pays more attention to posts with negative sentiment, which results in a significant increase in the reposted amount of such posts. This study fills a gap in current research by examining how the characteristics of the signal sender, signal, and signal receiver influence public sentiment and public information behavior regarding disaster-related information on social media.