"In the age of digital media, news avoidance behaviour is continually increasing. This behaviour has brought new challenges for society and democracy. Research on news avoidance has recently experienced a surge, particularly in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, there are many uncertainties
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on this topic, and this systematic literature review attempts to resolve them. This research uses the PRISMA framework to answer the research questions. Two databases are used for this study: Web of Science and Scopus. The study uses the inclusion criteria of research papers published in English and the exclusion criteria of review papers. The research study is based on a quantitative and qualitative analysis of 23 selected articles from both databases. Quantitative results show a sudden increase in the number of news avoidance studies in 2023. The analysis also revealed a dominance of quantitative methods and non-probability samples. The regional distribution of the studies underlines the concentration of research in Europe and North America. The qualitative analysis highlights the causes of news avoidance, the profile of news avoiders, the connection between news avoidance and news overload, social media and engagement, the disadvantages of avoidance, and solutions to avoidance. The study concludes that trust in news, interest in news, enjoyment of news consumption, news curation and constructive news provide a solution to news avoidance behaviour." (Abstract)
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"This book offers insights into social media practices and challenges in developing nations during the COVID-19 pandemic. Covering different aspects of social media during the pandemic, the book offers new frameworks, concepts, tools and techniques for integrating social media to support national de
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velopment. Thematically organised chapters from a global team of scholars address the different aspects of social media during pandemic. The book begins by looking at ICT for development and how development agencies have used social media platforms, before looking at engagement with these social media campaigns and the spread of misinformation. Further chapters cover the practical uses of social media in healthcare and virtual medicine, mental health issues and challenges, remote education, and government policies." (Publisher description)
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"This volume addresses the concept of “(in)nocent lies” in the media – beyond the concept of misleading information online, this extends to a deliberate effort to spread misinformation, disinformation and conspiracy theories – and proposes a critical approach to tackle the issue in related i
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nterdisciplinary fields. The book takes a multidisciplinary and international approach, addressing the digital divide and global inequality, as well as algorithmic bias, how misinformation harms vulnerable groups, social lynching and the effect of misinformation on certain social, political and cultural agendas, among other topics. Arranged thematically, the chapters paint a nuanced and original picture of this issue." (Publisher description)
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"This scholarly work discusses the historical, contemporary, and prospective dimensions of environmental activism and its intersection with global media. It provides a comprehensive view of the pivotal role played by the media in shaping awareness concerning environmental challenges and catalyzing a
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ctions to address them. Drawing upon the insights of an interdisciplinary cohort of scholars, the book systematically examines the diverse aspects of the nexus between media and environmental activism. Chapter contributions establish the foundational framework for comprehending how media as a whole lend support to activism; delineate the historical trajectory of environmental activism; the construction of narratives within the political, economic, and social domains of society; scrutinize the function of mass media within the context of globalization, digitization, and social media; and elucidate how governance structures influence the environmental activism process." (Publisher description)
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"The freedom of media and the safety of journalists are crucial elements in democratic societies. Despite global efforts to increase the safety of journalists, the profession remains plagued by perilous working conditions. With increasing digital threats to journalists' security and ability to work,
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blockchain technology might offer practical solutions to counteract specific vulnerabilities in the digital realm. This exploratory paper investigates the possible scopes of blockchain technology applications in improving the digital safety of journalists. With a qualitative analysis of semi-structured interviews with investigative journalists and blockchain experts, the study examines the threats journalists face in the digital realm and aims to understand the current and future opportunities and challenges of using blockchain technology for the digital safety of journalists. The results suggest that blockchain technology might already aid in protecting identities and communications, logging security breaches, and enabling decentralized data storage, among others. However, significant challenges exist in various dimensions, such as technical (e.g., scalability), political (e.g., lack of clear regulations), and social (e.g., acceptance). More research is needed to understand the full potential of blockchain technology in improving the digital safety of journalists and the steps and challenges ahead for a smooth adoption of this technology." (Abstract)
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"Television has a prime role to play in the formation of discursive domains in the everyday life of South Asian publics. This book explores various television media practices, social processes, mediated political experiences and everyday cultural compositions from Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan
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and Sri Lanka. With the help of country-specific case studies, it captures a broad range of themes which foreground the publics and their real-life experiences of television in the region. The chapters in this book discuss gendered television spaces, women seeking solace from television in pandemic, the taboo in digital TV dramas, television viewership and localizing publics, changing viewership from television to OTT, news and public perception of death, redefining ‘the national’, theatrical television and post-truth television news, among other key issues." (Publisher description)
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"This chapter explores some of the positive strategies employed by South Asian media institutions to enhance workplace happiness and help journalists to cope with stress and traumatic experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic. Happiness is crucial for media institutions because journalism is one of t
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he most stressful professions. Previous studies have found that the COVID-19 crisis has had a considerable impact on journalism. Hence, it is important to maintain workplace happiness in media institutions, particularly during a crisis like the pandemic." (Abstract)
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"[...] While many AI deployments serve public interest, journalists also need insight and expertise to alert about aspects like exclusions, unequal benefits, and violations of human rights. As part of its journalism education series, UNESCO’s International Programme for the Development of Communic
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ation (IPDC) has supported the World Journalism Education Council in commissioning this handbook. The aim is to inspire and empower so that journalism educators can help both journalism students and working journalists do justice to one of the major issues of our times. The handbook covers: understanding machine intelligence and identifying different types of AI; exploring AI’s potential, as well as its strengths and weaknesses; imagining diverse futures with AI by recognising pervasive popular narratives that inform public consciousness; understanding journalism’s role in mediating and shaping AI discourse; finding ways of reporting about AI in a nuanced, realistic and accountable manner; making connections to existing genres of journalism, ranging from general news reporting to data journalism." (Short summary)
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"Divided into five parts, the Handbook opens with a state-of-the-art overview of the subject’s intellectual landscape, introducing the historical background, theoretical foundations, and major academic approaches to communication, media, and religion. Subsequent sections focus on institutional and
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functional perspectives, theological and cultural approaches, and new approaches in digital technologies. The essays provide insight into a wide range of topics, including religious use of media, religious identity, audience gratification, religious broadcasting, religious content in entertainment, films and religion, news reporting about religion, race and gender, the sex-religion matrix, religious crisis communication, public relations and advertising, televangelism, pastoral ministry, death and the media, online religion, future directions in religious communication, and more." (Publisher description)
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"This edited collection seeks to better understand how journalism across cultures differs, presenting an in-depth exploration of global practices that departs from the typical Western-centric approach. Journalists across the world are trained, generally speaking, within Western models of reporting a
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nd are taught to do so as a practice where reporters need to aspire and aim for. Yet what such training is short of achieving is teaching reporters how to 'do' journalism within their own environments. In turn, what is required is a method of journalistic training and practice that is reflective of the actual practice reporters encounter on the ground. In order to do so, a better understanding of how journalism is practised in different parts of the world, the context surrounding such practices, the issues and challenges associated, and the positive practices that Western journalism can offer, is necessary. Promoting and deploying a culturally-specific and politically-relevant journalism, this book provides just that." (Publisher description)
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"This book examines how journalism can overcome harmful institutional issues such as work-related trauma and precarity, focusing specifically on questions of what happiness in journalism means, and how one can be successful and happy on the job. Acknowledging profound variations across people, genre
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s of journalism, countries, types of news organizations, and methodologies, this book brings together an array of international perspectives from academia and practice. It suggests that there is much that can be done to improve journalists’ subjective well-being, despite there being no one-size-fits-all solution. It advocates for a shift in mindset as much in theoretical as in methodological approaches, moving away from a focus on platforms and adaptation to pay real attention to the human beings at the center of the industry. That shift in mindset and approach involves exploring what happiness is, how happiness manifests in journalism and media industries, and what future we can imagine that would be better for the profession. Happiness is conceptualized from both psychological and philosophical perspectives. Issues such as trauma, harassment, inequality, digital security, and mental health are considered alongside those such as precarity, recruitment, emotional literacy, intelligence, resilience, and self-efficacy. Authors point to norms, values and ethics in their regions and suggest best practices based on their experience." (Abstract)
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"This paper is about newspaper journalism practices under the COVID-19 pandemic in Bangladesh. Based on two separate theories - Communication Competence Theory, and Risk and Crisis Communication Management Theory -, this study intends to understand the challenges that newspaper journalists faced whi
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le discharging their professional responsibilities and governing the newsroom operations during the first six months of the COVID-19 pandemic in Bangladesh. In addition, this paper explores the strategies that journalists followed to adapt to the changed working environments and engage themselves in the processes of news production and publication. The authors conducted in-depth interviews with 12 journalists including three news managers from three national dailies - daily Prothom Alo, daily Samakal, and The Daily Star. Standing on findings, the discussion progressed around six areas – governance of newsroom operations, preparations, communication, newsgathering, restrictions, insecurity and protection. The key findings are: i) the COVID19 crisis appeared as a blow before the newspaper journalists of Bangladesh due to a policy-level shortcoming in terms of formulating plans beforehand to govern the newsroom operations in the face of the challenges that emerged along with the pandemic; ii) the journalists were not comfortable in adapting themselves to the working from home strategy as they struggled in gathering and verifying information, and doing required communions using the virtual communication methods while working from distance; and iii) the journalists experienced psychological pressures because of multiple factors that included -- limited access to protective gear and fear of infection; protection of family members; adapting themselves to the changed working environments; and tension of losing the job in the pandemic crisis." (Abstract)
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"In many parts of the Global South, coordinated political disinformation campaigns, rumor, and propaganda have long been a part of the social fabric, even before disinformation has become an area of scholarship in the Global North. The way disinformation manifests in this region, and responses to it
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, can therefore be highly instructive for readers around the world. Through case studies and comparative analyses, the book explores the impact of disinformation in Africa, Latin America, the Arab World and Asia. The chapters in this book discuss the similarities and differences of disinformation in different regions and provide a broad thematic overview of the phenomenon as it manifests across the Global South. After analyzing core concepts, theories and histories from Southern perspectives, contributors explore the experiences of media users and the responses to disinformation by various social actors drawing on examples from a dozen countries." (Publisher description)
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"This volume presents a comparative exploration of Dalit autobiographical writing from India and of Latin American testimonio as subaltern voices from two regions of the Global South. Offering frames for linking global subalternity today, the chapters address Siddalingaiah's Ooru Keri; Muli's Life H
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istory; Manoranjan Byapari and Manju Bala's narratives; and Yashica Dutt's Coming Out as Dalit; among others, alongside foundational texts of the testimonio genre. While embedded in their specific experiences, the shared history of oppression and resistance on the basis of race/ethnicity and caste from where these subaltern life histories arise constitutes an alternative epistemological locus. The chapters point to the inadequacy of reading them within existing critical frameworks in autobiography studies." (Publisher description)
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"The contributions in the form of research articles and essays come from a variety of religious perspectives – Buddhist, Catholic, Muslim, Jain, Hindu, Protestant, Eastern Orthodox. Despite coming from different religious worldviews, the underlying message fundamentally affirms that promoting ecol
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ogical flourishing requires an approach that centers on both praxis and spirituality in order to prevent the task of caring for our common home to become simply a series of dry mechanical calculations, purely theoretical propositions, or clever policy enactments. Religions at their best inspire and infuse external acts that are consistent with authentic interior virtues ordered to the wellbeing of both humanity and the natural environment. In this respect, religions must undergo its own self-examination in order to adequately speak to the present context." (Page 176)
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"Moving beyond the U.S.-Eurocentric paradigm of communication theory, this handbook broadens the intellectual horizons of the discipline by highlighting underrepresented, especially non-Western, theorists and theories, and identifies key issues and challenges for future scholarship. Showcasing diver
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se perspectives, the handbook facilitates active engagement in different cultural traditions and theoretical orientations that are global in scope but local in effect. It begins by exploring past efforts to diversify the field, continuing on to examine theoretical concepts, models, and principles rooted in local cumulative wisdom. It does not limit itself to the mass-interpersonal communication divide, but rather seeks to frame theory as global and inclusive in scope. The book is intended for communication researchers and advanced students, with relevance to scholars with an interest in theory within information science, library science, social and cross-cultural psychology, multicultural education, social justice and social ethics, international relations, development studies, and political science." (Publisher description)
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"Influenza and COVID-19 are infectious diseases with significant burdens. Information and awareness on preventative techniques can be spread through the use of social media, which has become an increasingly utilized tool in recent years. This study developed a dynamic transmission model to investiga
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te the impact of social media, particularly tweets via the social networking platform, Twitter on the number of influenza and COVID-19 cases of infection and deaths. We modified the traditional Susceptible-Exposed-Infectious-Recovered (SEIR-V) model with an additional social media component, in order to increase the accuracy of transmission dynamics and gain insight on whether social media is a beneficial behavioral intervention for these infectious diseases. The analysis found that social media has a positive effect in mitigating the spread of contagious disease in terms of peak time, peak magnitude, total infected, and total death; and the results also showed that social media’s effect has a non-linear relationship with the reproduction number R 0 and it will be amplified when a vaccine is available. The findings indicate that social media is an integral part in the humanitarian logistics of pandemic and emergency preparedness, and contributes to the literature by informing best practices in the response to similar disasters." (Abstract)
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"This handbook offers an analysis of Asian diaspora and development and explores the role immigrants living within diasporic and transnational communities play in the development of their host countries and their homeland. Bringing together an array of interdisciplinary scholars from across the worl
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d, the handbook is divided into the following sections: Development Potential of Asian Diasporas; Diaspora, Homeland, and Development; Gender, Generation, and Identities; Soft Power, Mobilization, and Development; Media, Culture, and Representations." (Publisher description)
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"This book explores how religion manifests itself in television. It focuses on how religious traditions, practices, and discourses have been incorporated into non-religious television programmes and how they bring both the community and the media into the fold of religion. The volume traces the cult
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ural and institutional history of television in the state of Sikkim, India, to investigate how it became part of the cultural life of the communities. The author analyses three televised shows that captured the community’s imagination and became ceremonial and religious engagement. Through these case studies, he highlights how rituals and myths function in mass media, how traditional institutions and religious practices redefine themselves through their association with the visual mass medium, and how identities based on religion, cultural tradition, and politics are reinforced, transformed, and amplified through television. The book further analyses the engagement of televised religion with audiences, its reach, relevance, and contents and its relationship with urbanity, tradition, and identity." (Publisher description)
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