Stressogenic Elements of the Latent Impact of Real Media Reports on the COVID-19 Pandemic on Social Groups (Reporting the Methodology and Research Planning)

Abstract

This article reveals the preparation for the investigation of the latent impact of media reports about COVID-19 on social groups. The research project of the Institute of Journalism, funded by the National Research Foundation of Ukraine, shows how to use media monitoring to form an experimental sample of media reports on COVID-19 as well as how to make a sociological and psychological description of the method of forming experimental groups. The purpose of this study is to form a methodological basis for experiments. We will use all this as a proven tool for organizing experiments in the subsequent stages of research. Accordingly, the search for media messages on the topic of COVID-19 by the LOOQME service showed the existence of an information boom in the media (this does not take into account the flow of messages on social networks), measured daily by tens of thousands of media messages. Undoubtedly, each person does not “digest” so much information, respectively, is not affected by it in full. Therefore, the question arises about the functioning of a human being as an interpreter of specific messages available to them, but taking into account public opinion as an interpretive filter: what people are saying and how they relate to COVID. All this is the filter that sets the vector of perception and understanding. This factor we will take into account in the following stages of the project.