"Don't be afraid of COVID": Did Trump's tweets change peoples views on COVID?

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2021-02-02 03:00

International

Trump's tweets about his COVID infection may have influenced public opinion on whether the virus was a hoax and how serious the issue was, according to US research. The analysis of tweets from before, during and after Trump's infection suggest that most Twitter users saw COVID as a real and serious issue. However, prior to Trump's infection around 20 per cent of tweets pointed to a belief that COVID-19 was a hoax, but this dropped to around 3 per cent after Trump tweeted the news of his infection. This pattern reversed slightly after he tweeted, “Don’t be afraid of COVID-19”, with around 10 per cent of tweets suggesting a belief it was a hoax. The authors say these results suggest that some members of the public adapted beliefs in response to President Trump’s tweets and that social media can capture these changing perspectives, in real-time.

Media release

From: JAMA

Public Attitudes About COVID-19 in Response to President Trump’s Social Media Posts

JAMA Network Open
Research Letter

Public Attitudes About COVID-19 in Response to President Trump’s Social Media Posts

About JAMA Network Open: JAMA Network Open is the new online-only open access general medical journal from the JAMA Network. On weekdays, the journal publishes peer-reviewed clinical research and commentary in more than 40 medical and health subject areas. Every article is free online from the day of publication.

What The Study Did: Researchers used near real-time social media data to capture the public’s changing COVID-19–related attitudes when former President Trump was infected.

Authors: Sean D. Young, Ph.D., of the University of California, Irvine, is the corresponding author.

(doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2021.0101)

Editor’s Note: The article includes conflict of interest and funding/support disclosures. Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, conflict of interest and financial disclosures, and funding and support.

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conference: JAMA Network Open

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Organisation/s: University of California, USA

Funder: This study was supported by grant 7R01AI132030 from the NIAID (Dr Young) and grant 5R01MH106415 from the National Institute of Mental Health (Dr Young).

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