{"title":"Refueling a Quiet Fire: Old Truthers and New Discontent in the Wake of COVID-19.","authors":"Gabriele Beccari, Matilde Giaccherini, Joanna Kopinska, Gabriele Rovigatti","doi":"10.1215/00703370-11587755","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This article investigates the factors that contributed to the proliferation of online COVID skepticism on Twitter across Italian municipalities in 2020. We demonstrate that sociodemographic factors were likely to mitigate the emergence of skepticism, whereas populist political leanings were more likely to foster it. Furthermore, pre-COVID anti-vaccine sentiment, represented by \"old truthers\" on Twitter, amplified online COVID skepticism in local communities. Additionally, exploiting the spatial variation in restrictive economic policies with severe implications for suspended workers in nonessential economic sectors, we find that COVID skepticism spreads more in municipalities significantly affected by the economic lockdown. Finally, the diffusion of COVID skepticism is positively associated with COVID vaccine hesitancy.</p>","PeriodicalId":48394,"journal":{"name":"Demography","volume":" ","pages":"1613-1636"},"PeriodicalIF":3.6000,"publicationDate":"2024-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Demography","FirstCategoryId":"90","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1215/00703370-11587755","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"DEMOGRAPHY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
This article investigates the factors that contributed to the proliferation of online COVID skepticism on Twitter across Italian municipalities in 2020. We demonstrate that sociodemographic factors were likely to mitigate the emergence of skepticism, whereas populist political leanings were more likely to foster it. Furthermore, pre-COVID anti-vaccine sentiment, represented by "old truthers" on Twitter, amplified online COVID skepticism in local communities. Additionally, exploiting the spatial variation in restrictive economic policies with severe implications for suspended workers in nonessential economic sectors, we find that COVID skepticism spreads more in municipalities significantly affected by the economic lockdown. Finally, the diffusion of COVID skepticism is positively associated with COVID vaccine hesitancy.
期刊介绍：
Since its founding in 1964, the journal Demography has mirrored the vitality, diversity, high intellectual standard and wide impact of the field on which it reports. Demography presents the highest quality original research of scholars in a broad range of disciplines, including anthropology, biology, economics, geography, history, psychology, public health, sociology, and statistics. The journal encompasses a wide variety of methodological approaches to population research. Its geographic focus is global, with articles addressing demographic matters from around the planet. Its temporal scope is broad, as represented by research that explores demographic phenomena spanning the ages from the past to the present, and reaching toward the future. Authors whose work is published in Demography benefit from the wide audience of population scientists their research will reach. Also in 2011 Demography remains the most cited journal among population studies and demographic periodicals. Published bimonthly, Demography is the flagship journal of the Population Association of America, reaching the membership of one of the largest professional demographic associations in the world.
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