In Brief: COVID-19 Fuels Misinformation Fears; Local News Fights to Survive

Coronavirus Fear Fuels Misinformation, Researchers Find

Fear of COVID-19 causes people to think more rigidly and thus makes it harder for them to detect misinformation and more likely to spread it, says research published in January in the journal Frontiers in Communication.

Researchers in Italy and the United States found that individuals whose thinking is highly polarized — tending to believe information is entirely correct or entirely incorrect, with no nuance in between — are less likely to detect misinformation.

“In times of uncertainty, people often seek out information to help alleviate fear, possibly leaving them vulnerable to false information,” said Carola Salvi, Ph.D., the study’s lead author and a research scientist in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at The University of Texas. 

People who are afraid of coronavirus “also want to feel more in control of their lives,” she said, possibly leading them to overestimate “the value of seemingly profound statements that really weren’t so meaningful.”

Hedging Against Misconduct, Companies Defer Long-Term Executive Pay

Fearing their top officers might later be found to have committed misconduct, companies are withholding executives’ incentive pay for longer, The Wall Street Journal reports. 

Building on so-called “clawback” provisions, the changes seek to avoid the hassle of recouping money that an executive has already received.

Investors for Opioid and Pharmaceutical Accountability, a coalition of 61 institutional investors, has pushed for more responsibility from companies alleged to have helped facilitate opioid abuse through aggressive marketing, sales and distribution of prescription painkillers. Some executive bonuses are being deferred for a year or more, and boards can also choose to reduce the deferred pay if the recipient is found to have hurt the company’s reputation or finances.

Such principles “may serve as a useful guide to other industries,” said Connecticut Treasurer Shawn Wooden, whose office was part of the working group. Critics warn that deferred or forfeited pay could discourage executives from reporting misconduct and make it too easy for companies to rescind pay.

Does Exercise Make Us More Creative? 

Frequent exercise might spur creativity, a new study says. As The New York Times reports, researchers at the University of Graz in Austria found that active people have better ideas, and more of them, than people who are relatively sedentary.

For the study published in Scientific Reports, the researchers gave 79 healthy adults activity trackers for five days and then asked them to visit the lab, where they conceived new uses for car tires and umbrellas and finished partial drawings. Measured by the originality of their ideas, the most physically active volunteers also proved to be the most creative.

The research suggests “an association between creativity and physical activity in everyday life,” says Christian Rominger, a professor of psychology at the University of Graz and the study’s lead author. 

Still, the study looked at a brief moment in people’s lives and therefore cannot definitively conclude that being more active directly causes us to be more creative, only that activity and creativity are linked.

Local News Fights to Survive

Financial distress threatens local news and few expect advertising revenue will save the industry, new research finds. 

In a survey of nearly 1,400 members of the U.S. news media conducted by Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications, 81.2 percent were “very concerned” about the sustainability of local news, while 17.7 percent were “somewhat concerned.” Only 1 percent were “not at all concerned.”

Asked which business model is most promising for local news, 26.8 percent chose “converting from commercial to nonprofit status,” while 24.8 percent cited “reader revenue such as subscriptions.” Just 7.1 percent chose “growing advertising revenue.” At 36.4 percent, the option picked most was “all of the above.” 

Tim Franklin, senior associate dean of the Medill school in Evanston, Ill., just north of Chicago, suggested the news industry has an unrealistic view of nonprofit finances. Nancy Lane, CEO of the Local Media Association, said local news should diversify by combining “reader revenue, journalism funded by philanthropy, events and, to a lesser degree, advertising.”