Particulate matters: How trust and media use impact risk perceptions of air pollution in Beijing

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2015-01-01
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Qiu, Yue
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Michael F. Dahlstrom
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Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication
The Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication offers two majors: Advertising (instructing students in applied communication for work in business or industry), and Journalism and Mass Communication (instructing students in various aspects of news and information organizing, writing, editing, and presentation on various topics and in various platforms). The Department of Agricultural Journalism was formed in 1905 in the Division of Agriculture. In 1925 its name was changed to the Department of Technical Journalism. In 1969 its name changed to the Department of Journalism and Mass Communications; from 1969 to 1989 the department was directed by all four colleges, and in 1989 was placed under the direction of the College of Sciences and Humanities (later College of Liberal Arts and Sciences). In 1998 its name was changed to the Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication.
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Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication
Abstract

Trust is an important factor within the formation of risk perceptions, but is easily broken and difficult to rebuild. This study seeks to determine the long-term influence of a trust-breaking event with regard to an environmental risk. Specifically, this study explores how people in Beijing perceive the risk of PM2.5 air pollution and which sources they now use and trust for this information two years after the official media was criticized for not being trustworthy in its dissemination. Results find that respondents perceived PM2.5 air pollution as a significant threat across nine risk dimensions and that social media were most often used to obtain risk messages regarding PM2.5 air pollution. Relationships regarding trust were weak. More trusted sources were expected to be used more often for PM2.5 information, but this relationship was only found for interpersonal sources. Likewise, trust was expected to be related to risk perceptions, but was related with only a handful of risk factors, none of which were consistent across sources. Individuals more impacted by the trust-breaking event were expected to also exhibit less change of trust over time, but this was not found. This general lack of trust relationships may be due to an invalid measure of trust caused by fear of repercussion for criticizing governmental channels in an online survey.

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Fri Jan 01 00:00:00 UTC 2016