A neglected reality of mass media during COVID-19: Effect of pandemic news on individual's positive and negative emotion and psychological resilience

Numerous studies have demonstrated that mass media platforms are playing a crucial role in disseminating information about the COVID-19 pandemic. As media coverage of pandemic using frightening language has been speculated to induce emotional disturbances in people and fluctuations in their resilience level, this study was performed to explore the effect of COVID-19 related news on individual's emotions and resilience. It was hypothesized that altering the type of news would produce varying levels of emotions and resilience in participants. Both the recruitment of participants and the conduction of the study were done online in September when the pandemic hit the peak in India. Randomly assigned participants were exposed to three conditions: positive news (N = 56), negative news (N = 59), and neutral news (N = 60) related to COVID-19. Analyses revealed negative news significantly decreased positive emotions and resilience while positive news significantly reduced negative emotions and vice-versa. These finding suggest strong impact of mass media on individual's emotions and their own self-evaluation on resilience. The study highlights the responsibility of mass media and urges for bringing necessary changes in covering pandemic news and similar other uncertain situations in keeping people's emotions stable and increasing their psychological resilience.