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Trust in COVID-19 information sources and perceived risk among smokers: A nationally representative survey
BACKGROUND: Public health officials have classified smoking as a risk factor for COVID-19 disease severity. Smokers generally have less trust in health experts than do nonsmokers, leading to reduced risk perceptions. This study addresses smokers’ trust in information sources about COVID-19 and how t...
Autores principales: | , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Public Library of Science
2022
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8794215/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35085293 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0262097 |
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author | Reynolds, Reed M. Weaver, Scott R. Nyman, Amy L. Eriksen, Michael P. |
author_facet | Reynolds, Reed M. Weaver, Scott R. Nyman, Amy L. Eriksen, Michael P. |
author_sort | Reynolds, Reed M. |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: Public health officials have classified smoking as a risk factor for COVID-19 disease severity. Smokers generally have less trust in health experts than do nonsmokers, leading to reduced risk perceptions. This study addresses smokers’ trust in information sources about COVID-19 and how trust is associated with perceived COVID-19 susceptibility and severity among smokers. METHODS AND FINDINGS: A nationally representative sample of 1,223 current smokers were surveyed between October and November 2020, indicating their level of trust in COVID-19 information sources, and their perceptions of risk from COVID-19. Multiple differences in trustworthiness emerged; smokers trusted their personal doctor for information about COVID-19 more than other information sources, while news media were generally distrusted. In addition, the FDA was trusted less than the NIH and CDC. Several “trust gaps” were observed, indicating disparities in levels of trust associated with gender, ethnicity, education, and political orientation, which had the strongest association with trust of all factors. Political orientation was also a significant predictor of COVID-19 risk perceptions, but there was no independent effect of political orientation when accounting for trust, which was predictive of all risk perception outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: Trusted sources, such as personal doctors, may most effectively convey COVID-19 information across political orientations and sociodemographic groups. News media may be ineffective at informing smokers due to their low credibility. The results suggest that trust may explain the apparent effect of political orientation on COVID-19 risk perceptions. Implications for researchers, communication professionals, and policy makers are discussed. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-8794215 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2022 |
publisher | Public Library of Science |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-87942152022-01-28 Trust in COVID-19 information sources and perceived risk among smokers: A nationally representative survey Reynolds, Reed M. Weaver, Scott R. Nyman, Amy L. Eriksen, Michael P. PLoS One Research Article BACKGROUND: Public health officials have classified smoking as a risk factor for COVID-19 disease severity. Smokers generally have less trust in health experts than do nonsmokers, leading to reduced risk perceptions. This study addresses smokers’ trust in information sources about COVID-19 and how trust is associated with perceived COVID-19 susceptibility and severity among smokers. METHODS AND FINDINGS: A nationally representative sample of 1,223 current smokers were surveyed between October and November 2020, indicating their level of trust in COVID-19 information sources, and their perceptions of risk from COVID-19. Multiple differences in trustworthiness emerged; smokers trusted their personal doctor for information about COVID-19 more than other information sources, while news media were generally distrusted. In addition, the FDA was trusted less than the NIH and CDC. Several “trust gaps” were observed, indicating disparities in levels of trust associated with gender, ethnicity, education, and political orientation, which had the strongest association with trust of all factors. Political orientation was also a significant predictor of COVID-19 risk perceptions, but there was no independent effect of political orientation when accounting for trust, which was predictive of all risk perception outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: Trusted sources, such as personal doctors, may most effectively convey COVID-19 information across political orientations and sociodemographic groups. News media may be ineffective at informing smokers due to their low credibility. The results suggest that trust may explain the apparent effect of political orientation on COVID-19 risk perceptions. Implications for researchers, communication professionals, and policy makers are discussed. Public Library of Science 2022-01-27 /pmc/articles/PMC8794215/ /pubmed/35085293 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0262097 Text en © 2022 Reynolds et al https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Reynolds, Reed M. Weaver, Scott R. Nyman, Amy L. Eriksen, Michael P. Trust in COVID-19 information sources and perceived risk among smokers: A nationally representative survey |
title | Trust in COVID-19 information sources and perceived risk among smokers: A nationally representative survey |
title_full | Trust in COVID-19 information sources and perceived risk among smokers: A nationally representative survey |
title_fullStr | Trust in COVID-19 information sources and perceived risk among smokers: A nationally representative survey |
title_full_unstemmed | Trust in COVID-19 information sources and perceived risk among smokers: A nationally representative survey |
title_short | Trust in COVID-19 information sources and perceived risk among smokers: A nationally representative survey |
title_sort | trust in covid-19 information sources and perceived risk among smokers: a nationally representative survey |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8794215/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35085293 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0262097 |
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