Cognitive and Perceptual Biases in the Audience and Their Relationship to the Evaluation of Journalistic Content Credibility: A Case Study on the Initiative of Egyptian Cars Abroad within the Framework of Hostile Media and Third-Person Effect Theories

Authors

1 Faculty of Specific Education, Zagazig University

2 Department of Mass Communication, Faculty of Arts, Helwan University

Abstract

The study aimed to achieve four main objectives: observing, describing, and analyzing the factors influencing the audience's evaluation of the credibility of journalistic content; interpreting their perception of the impacts of negative content; understanding audience interactions and corrective virtual behaviors towards negative content about the Egyptian Cars Abroad initiative; and identifying and analyzing the relationship between cognitive and psychological biases and the audience's attitudes towards newspaper coverage of the initiative. Additionally, it sought to analyze the factors affecting the audience's trust in the credibility of coverage and handling of the initiative, including the communicator, media outlets, and comments and shares on social media platforms. The study also aimed to identify the sources the audience relies on for information about the initiative. The research employed media survey and case study methods, applied to a sample of 400 Egyptians working abroad.
The results indicated that pre-existing cognitive and psychological biases, such as biases from hasty conclusions, safe decisions, attention to negative information, and external attribution, significantly influence the perception of media hostility, regardless of objectivity. These biases also affect the evaluation of newspaper credibility.
The results also showed that the credibility of official newspapers and the contributions of others on social media platforms play a crucial role in building audience trust, The more transparent and interactive the audience perceives them to be, the higher their trust; The study found that when the audience feels media hostility and perceives that others may be negatively influenced by the negative content about the initiative, they are motivated to engage in corrective behaviors on social media, These behaviors include correcting misinformation and rumors, participating in discussions to provide accurate information, and raising awareness.

Keywords

References

Abdel Hamid, Amr. (2016). The Credibility of Social Media as Sources of News on Egyptian Political Events and Its Relationship to Media Hostility Among the Egyptian Public. Scientific Journal of Radio and Television Research, (8), October, 475-545.
Aljasir, S. (2019). Are classic theories of celebrity endorsements applicable to new media used by Arabs? A qualitative investigation of Saudi social media users. Journal of Creative Communications, 14(1), 15-30.‏ https://doi.org/10.1177/0973258618822
Amara, Naeila. (2006). Egyptian Public Perceptions of Media Bias: An Applied Study within the Framework of the Hostile Media Theory. Egyptian Journal of Public Opinion Research, December, 423-443.
Arpan, L. M., & Raney, A. A. (2003). An experimental investigation of news source and the hostile media effect. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 80(2), 265-281.‏ https://doi.org/10.1177/107769900308000203
Atef, Aya, Abdelbari, Wael, Abdel Aal, Alia, Saber, Iman. (2021). The Impact of Bias in Television Coverage of the 2020 Parliamentary Elections on the Formation of Political Communication Patterns: A Field Study on a Sample of Egyptian Political Party Youth. Journal of Research, 12(1), December, 35-72.
Barnidge, M., & Rojas, H. (2014). Hostile media perceptions, presumed media influence, and political talk: Expanding the corrective action hypothesis. International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 26(2), 135-156.‏ https://doi.org/10.1093/ijpor/edt032
Barnidge, M., Gunther, A. C., Kim, J., Hong, Y., Perryman, M., Tay, S. K., & Knisely, S. (2020). Politically motivated selective exposure and perceived media bias. Communication Research, 47(1), 84. https://doi.org/10.1177/0093650217713066
Cheng, Y., & Luo, Y. (2020). The presumed influence of digital misinformation: examining US public’s support for governmental restrictions versus corrective action in the COVID-19 pandemic. Online Information Review, 45(4), 834-852.‏ DOI 10.1108/OIR-08-2020-0386
Davison, W. P. (1983). The third-person effect in communication. Public opinion quarterly, 47(1), 1-15.‏ https://doi.org/10.1086/268763
Eisend, M. (2015). Persuasion knowledge and third-person perceptions in advertising: The moderating effect of regulatory competence. International Journal of Advertising, 34(1), 54-69.‏ https://doi.org/10.1080/02650487.2014.993792
El-Sayed, Abdelaziz. (2013). Attitudes of Egyptian Party Audiences Towards the Hostility of Egyptian Newspaper Coverage of the 2012 Constitution: A Field Study. Egyptian Journal of Media Research, (44)1, September, 77-118.
El-Shamy, Alaa. (2011). Electronic Opposition and Its Relationship to Political Transformations in the Arab World: A Case Study of the January 25th Revolution. Journal of Media Research, (36)2, October.
Eveland Jr, W. P., & McLeod, D. M. (1999). The effect of social desirability on perceived media impact: Implications for third-person perceptions. International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 11(4), 315-333.‏
Gamal, Riham. (2021). The Hostility of Media Discourse on Foreign Satellite Channels Directed Towards Internal Egyptian Issues (The 2019 Constitutional Amendments as a Model). Journal of Arts and Humanities, 92(2), January, 41-77.
Gearhart, S., Moe, A., & Zhang, B. (2020). Hostile media bias on social media: Testing the effect of user comments on perceptions of news bias and credibility. Human behavior and emerging technologies, 2(2), 140-148.‏ https://doi.org/10.1002/hbe2.185
Giner-Sorolla, R., & Chaiken, S. (1994). The causes of hostile media judgments. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 30, 165–180. https://doi.org/10.1006/jesp.1994.1008
Golan, G. J., & Day, A. G. (2008). The first-person effect and its behavioral consequences: A new trend in the twenty-five year history of third-person effect research. Mass Communication and Society, 11(4), 539-556.‏
Gunther, A. (1991). What we think others think: Cause and consequence in the third-person effect. Communication Research, 18(3), 355-372.‏
Gunther, A. C., & Chia, S. C. Y. (2001). Predicting pluralistic ignorance: The hostile media perception and its consequences. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 78(4), 688-701.‏
Gunther, A. C., & Schmitt, K. (2004). Mapping boundaries of the hostile media effect. Journal of Communication, 54(1), 55-70.‏ https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1460-2466.2004.tb02613.x
Gunther, A. C., & Storey, J. D. (2003). The influence of presumed influence. Journal of Communication, 53(2), 199-215.‏
Henriksen, L., & Flora, J. A. (1999). Third-person perception and children: Perceived impact of pro-and anti-smoking ads. Communication Research, 26(6), 643-665.‏
Hyun, K. D., & Seo, M. (2021). The effects of HMP and TPP on political participation in the partisan media context. Communication Research, 48(5), 665-686.‏ https://doi.org/10.1177/009365021882022
Kim, H. (2023). Immigrants’ dual identity and the hostile media effect in the context of sports broadcasts. Journal of Media Psychology: Theories, Methods, and Applications, 35(6), 335–345. https://doi.org/10.1027/1864-1105/a000375
Kim, K. S. (2011). Public understanding of the politics of global warming in the news media: the hostile media approach. Public understanding of science, 20(5), 692.doi: 10.1177/0963662510372313. PMID: 22164707.
Kim, Y. (2015). Exploring the effects of source credibility and others’ comments on online news evaluation. Electronic News, 9(3), 160-176.‏ https://doi.org/10.1177/1931243115593318
Kim, Y., & Hwang, H. (2019). When partisans see media coverage as hostile: The effect of uncivil online comments on hostile media effect. Media Psychology, 22(6), 845-866.‏
Kleinnijenhuis, J., Hartmann, T., Tanis, M., & van Hoof, A. M. (2020). Hostile media perceptions of friendly media do reinforce partisanship. Communication research, 47(2), 278.‏ https://doi.org/10.1177/0093650219836059
Lee, S., & Kim, K. (2023). I Participate in Politics Because the News is Influential Against Me: Hostile Media Perception, Third-Person Perception, and Political Participation. Mass Communication and Society, 1-23.‏
Lee, T. K., Kim, Y., & Coe, K. (2021). When social media become hostile media: An experimental examination of news sharing, partisanship, and follower count. In Social Media News and Its Impact (pp. 212-234). Routledge.‏
Lim, J. S. (2017). The third-person effect of online advertising of cosmetic surgery: A path model for predicting restrictive versus corrective actions. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 94(4), 972-993.‏ https://doi.org/10.1177/1077699016687722
Litovsky, Y. (2021). (Mis) perception of bias in print media: How depth of content evaluation affects the perception of hostile bias in an objective news report. PloS one, 16(5), e0251355.‏ https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0251355
Liu, B., & Wei, L. (2019). Machine Authorship In Situ: Effect of news organization and news genre on news credibility. Digital Journalism, 7(5), 635-657.‏ DOI: 10.1080/21670811.2018.1510740
Liu, Z. (2019). The Hostile Media Effect and Its Potential Consequences: Examining the Influence If Presumed Influence of International Media Coverage. Master thesis: University of South Florida.
Mahmoud, Ghada Shoukry. (2019). Journalists' Attitudes Towards the Hostility of Egyptian Newspaper Coverage of the Journalists' Syndicate Crisis with the Interior Ministry and Its Impact on the Electoral Decision for Syndicate Candidates. Scientific Journal of Journalism Research, (17), January, 161-221.
Mansour, Mary. (2022). Readers' Evaluation of Newspaper Pages' Performance on Facebook: An Analytical Study of Readers' Comments. Scientific Journal of Journalism Research, 24(1), December, 159-200.
Matthes, J. (2013). The affective underpinnings of hostile media perceptions: Exploring the distinct effects of affective and cognitive involvement. Communication Research, 40(3), 360-387.‏
McKeever, B. W., Riffe, D., & Carpentier, F. D. (2012). Perceived hostile media bias, presumed media influence, and opinions about immigrants and immigration. Southern Communication Journal, 77(5), 420-437.‏
Modgil, S., Singh, R. K., Gupta, S., & Dennehy, D. (2024). A confirmation bias view on social media induced polarisation during Covid-19. Information Systems Frontiers, 26(2), 420.‏
Nabi, R. L. (2009). "Emotion and Media Effects." In J. Bryant & M. B. Oliver (Eds.), Media Effects: Advances in Theory and Research (3rd ed., pp. 184-198). Routledge.
Nada, Ayman Mansour. (2012). Factors Influencing Public Opinion Attitudes Towards Satellite Channel Coverage of the Transfer of Power in Egypt and Related Events: A Survey Study within the Framework of the Hostile Media and Knowledge Illusion Theories. The First Annual Scientific Conference of the Canadian University in cooperation with the Regional Institute of Journalism at Al-Ahram Foundation. March 19-21.
Nix, J., & Pickett, J. T. (2017). Third-person perceptions, hostile media effects, and policing: Developing a theoretical framework for assessing the Ferguson effect. Journal of criminal justice, 51, 24-33.‏ https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcrimjus.2017.05.016
Paul, B., Salwen, M. B., & Dupagne, M. (2000). The third-person effect: A meta-analysis of the perceptual hypothesis. Mass Communication & Society, 3(1), 57-85.‏ https://doi.org/10.1207/S15327825MCS0301_04
Peiser, W., & Peter, J. (2000). Third‐person perception of television‐viewing behavior. Journal of Communication, 50(1), 25-45.
Perloff, R. M. (1989). Ego-involvement and the third person effect of televised news coverage. Communication research, 16(2), 236-262.‏ https://doi.org/10.1177/009365089016002
Perloff, R. M. (2018). A three-decade retrospective on the hostile media effect. In Advances in Foundational Mass Communication Theories (pp. 196-224). Routledge.‏
Ran, W., & Yamamoto, M. (2024). Neutral news from in-and out-party media and attitudes toward them: integration of expectancy violations theory and hostile media perceptions. Communication Studies, 1-20.‏ https://doi.org/10.1080/10510974.2024.2353393
Rea, L. M., & Parker, R. A. (2014). Designing and conducting survey research: A comprehensive guide. John Wiley & Sons.‏128- 129.
Samir, Amira. (2023). The Hostility of Media Coverage of National Projects and Its Relationship to the Presumed Influence on Others and Corrective Actions. Egyptian Journal of Media Research, (84), July, 1-45.
Schmitt, K. M., Gunther, A. C., & Liebhart, J. L. (2004). Why partisans see mass media as biased. Communication Research, 31(6), 623-641.‏
Schulz, A., Wirth, W., & Müller, P. (2020). We are the people and you are fake news: A social identity approach to populist citizens’ false consensus and hostile media perceptions. Communication research, 47(2), 201-226.‏
Schweisberger, V., Billinson, J., & Chock, T. M. (2014). Facebook, the third-person effect, and the differential impact hypothesis. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 19(3), 403-413.‏ ttps://doi.org/10.1111/jcc4.12061
Shen, L., Palmer, J., Mercer Kollar, L. M., & Comer, S. (2015). A social comparison explanation for the third-person perception. Communication Research, 42(2), 260-280.‏ https://doi.org/10.1177/0093650212467644
Stroud, N. J. (2008). Media use and political predispositions: Revisiting the concept of selective exposure. Political behavior, 30, 342-343. DOI 10.1007/s11109-007-9050-9
Sun, Y., Shen, L., & Pan, Z. (2008). On the behavioral component of the third-person effect. Communication Research, 35(2), 257-278.‏ https://doi.org/10.1177/009365020731
Tsfati, Y., & Cohen, J. (2012). Perceptions of media and media effects: The third person effect, trust in media and hostile media perceptions. The international encyclopedia of media studies.‏
Vallone, R. P., Ross, L., & Lepper, M. R. (1985). The hostile media phenomenon: Biased perception and perceptions of media bias in coverage of the Beirut massacre. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 49(3), 577–585. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.49.3.577
van der Gaag, M., Schütz, C., Ten Napel, A., Landa, Y., Delespaul, P., Bak, M., ... & De Hert, M. (2013). Development of the Davos assessment of cognitive biases scale (DACOBS). Schizophrenia Research, 144(1-3), 63-71.‏
Van der Kaa, H., & Krahmer, E. (2014, October). Journalist versus news consumer: The perceived credibility of machine written news. In Proceedings of the Computation+ Journalism Conference, Columbia University, New York (Vol. 24, p. 25).‏
Vraga, E. K., Tully, M., Akin, H., & Rojas, H. (2012). Modifying perceptions of hostility and credibility of news coverage of an environmental controversy through media literacy. Journalism, 13(7), 944-945. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884912455906
Vraga, E. K., Tully, M., Akin, H., & Rojas, H. (2012). Modifying perceptions of hostility and credibility of news coverage of an environmental controversy through media literacy. Journalism, 13(7), 945.
Wei, R., & Golan, G. (2013). Political advertising on social media in the 2012 presidential election: Exploring the perceptual and behavioral components of the third-person effect. Electronic News, 7(4), 225. https://doi.org/10.1177/1931243113506903
Winsvold, M., & Folkestad, B. (2024). Does the media seem more hostile to losers? Media bias perceptions among politicians in the wake of Norwegian municipal mergers. Local Government Studies, 1-21.‏ https://doi.org/10.1080/03003930.2024.2332634
Youssef, Nashwa. (2023). The Extent of Hostility in Digital Platform Coverage of Sports Events and Its Relationship to University Youth Attitudes Towards Football Fanaticism. Egyptian Journal of Media Research, 82(1), January, 357-421.

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics