Knowledge acquisition in times of the 2020 coronavirus pandemic: evidence from a four-wave panel study

This paper focuses on the accuracy of COVID-19-related knowledge during the 2020 pandemic. We look at the effects of traditional vs. digital news use and distinguish between positive (number of recoveries) and negative (number of casualties) knowledge. Importantly, the moderating role of crisis context is examined when tracing media effects on knowledge. Relying on a four-wave panel survey fielded in the Netherlands, we find that people’s knowledge became more accurate over the course of the crisis. News exposure did not lead to more accuracy, in fact, a negative relation was found. The impact of digital news use weakened as the crisis continued

The economy, the news, and the public: A longitudinal study of the impact of economic news on economic evaluations and expectations

This article studies the tripartite relationship between the economy, economic news, and public economic perceptions. Our analysis is twofold: We investigate the impact of the real economy on economic news in Dutch newspapers (2002-2015, N = 127,120); second, we analyze the impact of economic news on public economic perceptions. Our empirical approach builds on and contributes to the literature by making nuanced distinctions between (a) economic levels and changes (positive/negative), (b) volume and tone of coverage (positive/negative), and, most importantly, (c) people’s retrospective and prospective economic judgments. Our analyses show that the public is presented a version of economic reality that is skewed to the negative, which strongly affects people’s economic expectations but not evaluations. Extending media-dependency theory, these results demonstrate the necessity to both conceptually and empirically distinguish between people’s retrospective and prospective judgments

Taking it personal or national? Understanding the indirect effects of economic news on government support

This article studies the impact of economic news on government support and the mediating role of people’s national (sociotropic) and personal (egotropic) economic evaluations. Employing two complementary studies, a large literature is contributed to by adding a media perspective to the economic voting hypothesis. The first study was fielded in 2015 and combines an extensive content analysis of economic news (print, television, online; N = 5,630) with a three-wave panel survey (N = 3,240). As a follow-up, an experiment was conducted in 2018 exposing participants (N = 1,452) to negative and positive economic news. Both studies confirm that the tone of news directly affects national economic evaluations but not personal ones. Whereas both types of evaluation predict government support, the effect of national evaluations is significantly stronger. Most importantly, it is shown that the effect of national evaluations on government support is actually a mediation of the effect of economic news

To Credit or to Blame? The Asymmetric Impact of Government Responsibility in Economic News

This article studies the asymmetric effects of credit and blame attributions in economic news on government evaluations. We rely on a dataset combining a manual content analysis of Dutch economic news (print, television, online; N = 5,630) with a three-wave panel survey (N = 3,240) that was fielded in 2015. Results show that people who are exposed to news in which the government is blamed for the economy tend to adopt this frame by assigning responsibility to the government for the economic crisis. In addition, exposure to blame attributions leads to more negative government evaluations. This effect is partly mediated through the attribution of crisis responsibility. Credit attributions in the news do not have any effect on public opinion

An optimized BSCCO/Ag resonator coil for utility use

AC coils made with BSCCO-2223/Ag tapes and operating in liquid nitrogen have a potential for power related applications, e.g., inductors, transformers and current limiters. High-Tc tapes are available from several producers, while access to the coil building know-help is still rather limited, The relevant knowledge and technology suitable for making HTS coils for 50-60 Hz operation is being developed as a part of the current project. To verify the technology, several test solenoids and a first full-scale sub-coil have been manufactured. Electromagnetic, thermal and mechanical analysis of the coils is performed. The electromagnetic analysis focuses on the reduction of the radial magnetic field component in the windings. Voltage-current characteristics and the AC loss data obtained from relevant short sample measurements are applied. A good agreement between calculated and measured V-I curves and losses of the coils is found. A remarkable increase of the critical current and the reduction of the AC loss at the coil edges are predicted and confirmed experimentally. With the losses defined, thermal analysis and optimization of the coil structure are performed numerically followed by measurements for verification. The paper reports on the series of coils developed and explains the features of the projec