The Existence And Influencing Factors Of Negative Bias In Information Dissemination

Information and its dissemination play a very important role in our lives,but there is a common phenomenon:in the process of information dissemination,compared with positive or neutral information,attention to negative information always seems to be given priority,which is called "Bad news has wings".Based on the negative bias effect in psychology,this study proves the existence of this phenomenon from the overall and individual perspectives,and further explores its influencing factors.Four steps are taken.Firstly,contents of news with high clicks on news websites are analysized.Secondly,dichotic listening experiment is conducted using sound after positive and negative information is equivalized.Thirdly,under the condition of the equivalence of positive and negative information,a group of subjects play the role of receivers to select among the information of the same theme yet different qualities.Lastly,another group of subjects play the role of communicators to select.After those four studies,the existence of negative bias in the process of information dissemination is proved.Then,two experiments are conducted to explore the effect of insecurity on individual negative bias of different roles(receiver,communicators)in the process of information dissemination.This study draws the following conclusions:(1)On the whole,the receiver has negative bias for information reception.On the premise of positive and negative equivalence,when information is presented in the form of sound,the receiver has obvious negative bias.On the other hand,when information is presented in the form of text,the receiver has obvious negative bias.In other word,in the process of information dissemination,individuals who play the role of receiver has obvious negative bias.(2)On the premise of positive and negative equivalence,when information is presented in the form of text,individuals who play the role of communicators not only have no negative bias,but also give priority to the dissemination of positive information.(3)Increased insecurity can impel individuals to receive more negative information,but high insecurity can make individuals transmit more positive information.