{"title":"Official media use, political participation, and government trust structure an empirical study based on the attitude of Chinese netizens","authors":"Qian Hu, Yanping Pu","doi":"10.1177/10434631241266494","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"While research has explored the relationship between official media use and hierarchical government trust, there is a lack of studies that delve deeper into the relationship between official media use and government trust structure. Therefore, this study uses data from the 2017-2018 Chinese netizens’ social awareness non-tracking survey and employs rational choice theory and process-based trust mechanisms theory to empirically explore, for the first time, the relationship between official media use and government trust structure, along with its underlying mechanisms. Government trust structure is divided into four categories based on the different levels of trust in the central government and local government: paradoxical government trust, equal distrust, hierarchical government trust and equal trust. Among them, hierarchical government trust can be divided into central-distrust-local-distrust, central-trust-local-distrust, and central-trust-local-trust. The study finds that although hierarchical government trust decreases, it is the dominant form of government trust structure, and central-trust-local-distrust is the dominant form of hierarchical government trust. The transformation of other government trust structures into hierarchical government trust of central-trust-local-trust is associated with official media use, and political participation has a mediating effect in official media use and government trust structure. Our findings not only deepen the understanding of rational choice theory and process-based trust mechanism theory but also expand the comprehensive understanding of government trust structure in authoritarian regimes like China.","PeriodicalId":47079,"journal":{"name":"Rationality and Society","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.3000,"publicationDate":"2024-07-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Rationality and Society","FirstCategoryId":"90","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1177/10434631241266494","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"SOCIOLOGY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
While research has explored the relationship between official media use and hierarchical government trust, there is a lack of studies that delve deeper into the relationship between official media use and government trust structure. Therefore, this study uses data from the 2017-2018 Chinese netizens’ social awareness non-tracking survey and employs rational choice theory and process-based trust mechanisms theory to empirically explore, for the first time, the relationship between official media use and government trust structure, along with its underlying mechanisms. Government trust structure is divided into four categories based on the different levels of trust in the central government and local government: paradoxical government trust, equal distrust, hierarchical government trust and equal trust. Among them, hierarchical government trust can be divided into central-distrust-local-distrust, central-trust-local-distrust, and central-trust-local-trust. The study finds that although hierarchical government trust decreases, it is the dominant form of government trust structure, and central-trust-local-distrust is the dominant form of hierarchical government trust. The transformation of other government trust structures into hierarchical government trust of central-trust-local-trust is associated with official media use, and political participation has a mediating effect in official media use and government trust structure. Our findings not only deepen the understanding of rational choice theory and process-based trust mechanism theory but also expand the comprehensive understanding of government trust structure in authoritarian regimes like China.
期刊介绍:
Rationality & Society focuses on the growing contributions of rational-action based theory, and the questions and controversies surrounding this growth. Why Choose Rationality and Society? The trend toward ever-greater specialization in many areas of intellectual life has lead to fragmentation that deprives scholars of the ability to communicate even in closely adjoining fields. The emergence of the rational action paradigm as the inter-lingua of the social sciences is a remarkable exception to this trend. It is the one paradigm that offers the promise of bringing greater theoretical unity across disciplines such as economics, sociology, political science, cognitive psychology, moral philosophy and law.