Political Consequences of COVID-19 and Media Framing in South Korea

This study explored the Korean media's framing of COVID-19 and its impact on people's support for the government. A disaster such as a public health crisis has political consequences. COVID-19 is no exception. However, the direction of the effect is not easily determined. To properly under...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Frontiers in public health 2020-08, Vol.8, p.425-425
Main Authors: Jo, Wonkwang, Chang, Dukjin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Communications Media
COVID-19
framing
Humans
media
Public Health
public health crisis
Quarantine
Republic of Korea
SARS-CoV-2
structural topic model
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Summary:This study explored the Korean media's framing of COVID-19 and its impact on people's support for the government. A disaster such as a public health crisis has political consequences. COVID-19 is no exception. However, the direction of the effect is not easily determined. To properly understand this phenomenon, it is necessary to analyze how the media frames the crisis. Using Structural Topic Model, this study examines the Korean media's framing of COVID-19 and especially pays attention to international comparative framing. Based on our analysis results, we argue that expanded framing, which compared the quarantine performance of Korea and other countries, induced a positive change in people's attitudes toward the government, leading to a major political victory for the ruling party in the legislative election. Our research not only identifies the impact of international comparative framing on government support but also contributes to the development of methods for measuring media framing utilizing topic modeling methods.
ISSN:2296-2565
2296-2565
DOI:10.3389/fpubh.2020.00425