On 24 October, an article published in the Journal of Loss and Trauma studied the “relationships of media use and interpersonal communication as they relate to COVID-19 exposure and mental health outcomes.”
The researchers, professors in communication and social work at the Universities of Tennessee and Missouri, have found:
“Since the pandemic began, anxiety rates in the U.S. have tripled; the rate of depression has quadrupled. Now research is suggesting the media is part of the problem.”
The researchers summarized the results of their study in an article published on 16 February on the journalistic website, The Conversation. The article is titled, “How the Media may be Making the COVID-19 Mental Health Epidemic Worse.” The study is based on a survey of more than 1,500 American adults.
Many in the study who contracted COVID experienced mental stress and anxiety issues well after they recovered. The researchers state:
“Beyond the associations between level of disaster exposure and adverse mental health, a substantial body of research has documented problematic mental health reactions associated with paying more attention to traditional media (e.g., television, newspaper, radio) coverage of disasters.”
In addition to the anxieties heightened from watching and listening to traditional media, social media platforms exacerbated mental health issues as well. “Early research on the COVID-19 pandemic has found that among adults in China, more exposure to social media coverage of COVID-19 was related to more negative affect, anxiety, and depression.”
Among the key findings:
- “Media coverage of disasters is often ‘pervasive, continuous, and intense.’”
- “COVID-19 has resulted in an infodemic, which is characterized by an overwhelming amount of information that can be difficult for individuals to process.”
- “Results found that COVID-19 exposure was associated with depression via the indirect pathways of traditional and social media use. Media use thus appears to be the mechanism by which COVID-19-exposed participants experienced more depressive reactions. This could include media coverage of COVID-19 transmission rates, economic impacts, and more.”
The devastating mental health effect of continuous, anxiety-ridden media headlines was anticipated back in March 2020. In an article published on 3 March in Psychology Today, clinical psychologist Dr. David O. Clark, Professor Emeritus at the University of New Brunswick, Canada, warned:
“Media coverage of health issues is biased. The news outlets devote more time to emerging health hazards, like the COVID-19 outbreak than common health threats. Anxious or fearful individuals tend to pay more attention to threat-related information, which then drives up their anxiety and distress. With the media devoting so much time to the coronavirus outbreak, there’s plenty of opportunity for those with elevated contamination fear to focus on the threatening aspects of the outbreak.
This will cause a spike in fear and anxiety about the disease. In response, non-infected individuals with OCD-like contamination fear might restore to extraordinary measures to deal with their fear, like self-quarantine or washing with toxic disinfectants.”
TRENDPOST: Yes, selling fear, misery, and hysteria is the bottom line for mainstream media. In the 7 July issue of the Trends Journal, we wrote:
For the three months ending in June, CNN attracted its largest audience since it first went on the air 40 years ago. No surprise. Go back to 10 March and take a look at our Trends Journal cover: COVID-19: PRESSTITUTES & PUPPET MASTERS PEDDLING HYSTERIA. It paid off.
On a recent conference call, CNN chief Jeff Zucker urged editors and producers at the network not to shift focus from coronavirus new updates despite weeks of wall-to-wall coverage of the pandemic. “You need to stay on the news,” Mr. Zucker said, according to a person who listened. “People are coming to CNN for the news right now.”
We noted back in March that when CNN and other major media began hyping the coronavirus, their ratings – like the corporate pimps who run the operations and the Presstitutes who get paid to put out for them – were in the toilet.
Now, CNN’s weekday, primetime audience is up 120 percent compared to the same time a year ago, with close to two million tuning in.
In response to the rising ratings, CNN’s chief executive Jeff Zucker crowed, “All of our research shows we are the most trusted name in news.”
He added, “We are a news organization that is built for this kind of time.”
It also points out that “government briefly seized the high ground… when people entrusted it with leading the fight against COVID-19 and restoring economic health. But the government failed the test and squandered that trust bubble.”
One of the most prominent examples of a government leader “squandering that trust bubble” was New York Governor Andrew Cuomo. Last spring, Cuomo was heralded nationwide as one of the most dynamic and successful political leaders against the spread of the coronavirus, receiving an Emmy Award for his “masterful” COVID-19 press briefings.
Yet, now, in the deep muck of his deadly orders to move recovering COVID patients back into nursing homes, causing a spike in nursing home deaths and then ordering his staff to lie about the death toll, the Emmy award-winning Governor is subject to headlines such as CNBC’s: “Cuomo under fire over COVID death probe, bullying accusations.”