The influence of media coverage and environmental conditions on the perception and evaluation of impersonal risks by the example of the chestnut leaf miner.

以栗叶潜蚁为例，探讨媒体报道和环境条件对非个人风险感知和评估的影响。

• 批准号: 242144331
• 负责人: Professor Dr. Hans-Bernd Brosius
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Institut für Kommunikationswissenschaft und Medienforschung
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Priority Programmes
• 财政年份: 2013
• 资助国家: 德国
• 起止时间: 2012-12-31 至 2014-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/242144331?language=en
• 关键词: influence; media; coverage; environmental; conditions

Information about environmental change and associated risks are communicated to the public mainly through mass media. This information, along with the individual perception of environmental changes, is the basis for the subjective assessment of environmental risks. Impersonal risks are increasingly relevant: risks which are not perceived as a direct personal threat to the individual but as a threat to the environment and which, however, have direct consequences for the individuals (e.g. global warming). The relationships between media effects, information processing of environmental communication and the individual perception of environmental change according to impersonal risks have not yet been explored. These relationships are essential for explaining individual behavior and adaptation to environmental change. The proposed project will study this relationship from an interdisciplinary perspective. A field experiment by the example of the chestnut leaf miner, Cameraria ohridella, will be conducted. This is an invasive species whose larvae can cause a distinctive pattern of damage to chestnut trees as a result of the feeding activity. The leaves turn brown ahead of time, and fall early in July and August. This environmental change is clearly observable for the population. The horse chestnut is a common tree in Germany; however, the infestation of the trees varies within Germany. The horse chestnut leaf miner is therefore an ideal model organism by which the environmental awareness of individuals can be varied by selecting differently affected areas within Germany for the survey. A field experiment will be conducted in 12 different regions in Germany. The regions will be selected by using scientific rating processes in order to include differently affected regions. Thus, the perceivable environmental change for the respondents will vary clearly between regions.The project is divided into three research questions. First, it investigates how different information from mass media on impersonal risks is processed and which correlations with the individual perception of the environment show up. Second, it examines relevant factors of information processing and environmental perception for the subjective perception of risk. The interaction between media reporting on risks and subjective risk perception is of certain interest: Does the consistency between reporting and subjective perception reinforces the subjective risk perception? These results will also serve to enhance theories on media effects. Third, the field experiment enables to evaluate implemented actions of the respondents. The results will explain behavioral adaptations as a result from the subjective risk perception and information processing on impersonal risks, and answer the question to what extent this can be explained by media effects.

有关环境变化和相关风险的信息主要通过大众传播媒介传播给公众。这些信息，连同个人对环境变化的感知，是对环境风险进行主观评价的基础。非个人风险的相关性越来越强：不被认为是对个人的直接个人威胁，而是对环境的威胁，但对个人有直接后果的风险（例如全球变暖）。媒介效应、环境传播的信息加工与个体根据客观风险感知环境变化之间的关系尚未得到探讨。这些关系对于解释个体行为和对环境变化的适应至关重要。拟议的项目将从跨学科的角度研究这种关系。以板栗叶螨为例，进行了田间试验。这是一种入侵物种，其幼虫可以对栗树造成一种独特的损害模式，这是摄食活动的结果。树叶会提前变黄，在7月和8月早落。这种环境变化对人口来说是显而易见的。七叶树在德国是一种常见的树木；然而，在德国，树木的侵扰情况各不相同。因此，七叶虫是一种理想的模式生物，通过在德国选择不同的受影响地区进行调查，可以改变个体的环境意识。田间试验将在德国的12个不同地区进行。这些地区将通过科学的评级程序来选择，以包括不同的受影响地区。因此，被调查者感知到的环境变化在不同地区之间会有明显的差异。该项目分为三个研究问题。首先，它调查了大众媒体关于非个人风险的不同信息是如何被处理的，以及与个人对环境的感知之间的相关性。其次，研究了风险主观感知的信息加工和环境感知的相关因素。媒体对风险的报道与主观风险感知之间的相互作用令人感兴趣：报道与主观感知之间的一致性是否强化了主观风险感知？这些结果也将有助于加强有关媒介效应的理论。第三，实地实验可以评估受访者实施的行动。研究结果将解释行为适应是主观风险感知和非客观风险信息加工的结果，并回答媒体效应在多大程度上可以解释这一问题。