The Effect of Fear Elements on Health Behavior in the News Abstract

Abstract

The media employs various techniques to persuade large groups of people, one of which is the use of fear appeal in advertising. This study aims to reveal how fear appeal is used in news content published during the Covid-19 pandemic and its effect on the cognitive evaluation process that drives behavior change in individuals. To achieve this goal, the research was conducted in two stages. The first stage involved a review of news published between March 11, 2020 (when the first Covid-19 case in Türkiye was announced) and September 11, 2020 to identify the types of fear elements used and how they were constructed. A content analysis of 60 news articles in health-related categories, which contained fear appeal selected from four national newspapers, was carried out. In the second stage, field research was conducted to find out the impact of the fear elements identified in the news content on readers. A survey was administered to 418 participants aged 18 and above, and the dataset was analyzed using the descriptive analysis method. The survey contained statements about the components of perceived sensitivity, perceived severity, perceived effectiveness of response, and self-efficacy regarding the threat. Key results of the study indicate that news about the risks of not paying attention to hygiene and cleanliness has the greatest impact on participants’ perceptions of threat sensitivity, news about Covid-19 potentially leading to other diseases increases the perceived severity of the threat, and news about individuals experiencing the disease has the greatest impact on the perceived effectiveness of the response.