Health communication and trust in institutions during the COVID-19 lockdown in China's urban communities

Communicating health knowledge effectively at the community level is essential for shaping resilient urban governance in a pandemic period. This paper examines how three styles of community health communication, namely traditional authoritative communication (TAC), authoritative communication via social media (ACSM), and interactive communication via social media (ICSM), were associated with public trust in different types of “institutions”, namely the community administration and scientists, in a context where the respondents were in strict lockdown. This research was conducted with an online survey in February 2020 of 4595 respondents in urban China not long after the strict lockdown was introduced. Embedded in the theory of public trust in institutions during pandemic, the regressions established that traditional authoritative communication played a significant role in maintaining the public's trust in both community administrators and scientists. Interactive communication via social media damaged trust in scientists and increased trust in administrators when used effectively. It is suggested that policymakers, government officials, and healthcare professionals should not abandon traditional authoritative health communication, and greater efforts can be devoted to quality improvement. Moreover, the study highlighted the need to gain a better understanding of what the targeted audience perceive to be “good communication” before communication.