ArticleInformation processing & management2021
Information avoidance during health crises: Predictors of avoiding information about the COVID-19 pandemic among german news consumers.
Article in Information processing & management, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 25 papers.
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Who cites it
25 citing papers in PubMed.
- From information overload to health information avoidance among Chinese adults aged 50 years and above: the association of self-perceptions of aging and techno-exhaustion.BMC psychology · 2026Article
- Investigating Oral Health Information Avoidance Among Chinese Young Adults: The Roles of Subjective Norms, Message Fatigue, and Loss Aversion-A Cross-Sectional Study.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Portrayal of risk information and its impact on audiences' risk perception during the Covid-19 pandemic: A multi-method approach.Risk analysis : an official publication of the Society for Risk Analysis · 2025Article
- Avoid or verify? How do social media users navigate cognitive conflict in health information on social media platforms?Frontiers in public health · 2025Article
- Does Cyberchondria Influence Subjective Well-Being in Online Healthcare platforms?-An Empirical Study.Psychology research and behavior management · 2025Article
- Information and authority: research on the mechanism of offspring's health information avoidance behavior.Frontiers in public health · 2025Article
- Research on health information avoidance behavior and influencing factors of cancer patients-an empirical analysis based on structural equation modeling.BMC public health · 2024Article
- How older adults manage misinformation and information overload - A qualitative study.BMC public health · 2024Article
- Generation Z's Health Information Avoidance Behavior: Insights From Focus Group Discussions.Journal of medical Internet research · 2024Article
- Characteristics and associated factors of health information-seeking behaviour among patients with inflammatory bowel disease in the digital era: a scoping review.BMC public health · 2024Article
- Exploring the relationship between older adults' online health information seeking, negative emotions and prevention behaviors in the pandemic context: a two-wave longitudinal study.Frontiers in public health · 2024Article
- Adoption of a COVID-19 Contact Tracing App by Czech Youth: Cross-Cultural Replication Study.JMIR human factors · 2023Article
- [A gendered perspective of information behaviors, its drivers, and barriers : Results of an online survey of a sample stratified for the German population].Bundesgesundheitsblatt, Gesundheitsforschung, Gesundheitsschutz · 2023Article
- Article
- Avoiding Covid-19 risk information in the United States: The role of attitudes, norms, affect, social dominance orientations, and perceived trustworthiness of scientists.Risk analysis : an official publication of the Society for Risk Analysis · 2023Article
- A Comparison of Women's and Men's Web-Based Information-Seeking Behaviors About Gender-Related Health Information: Web-Based Survey Study of a Stratified German Sample.Journal of medical Internet research · 2023Article
- Impact of social media news on COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy and vaccination behavior.Telematics and informatics · 2023Article
- Empathy moderates the relationship between cognitive load and prosocial behaviour.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Information avoidance in the age of COVID-19: A meta-analysis.Information processing & management · 2023Article
- Psychometric Properties of the COVID-19 Pandemic Fatigue Scale: Cross-sectional Online Survey Study.JMIR public health and surveillance · 2022Article
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Abstract
This study investigates the prevalence of source-specific information avoidance among German consumers and predictors of information-avoidance behavior in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. Guided by the Risk Information Seeking and Processing Model (RISP), we propose that the perceived social norms, information insufficiency, risk perception, affective risk response, and attitudes toward seeking predict information avoidance. We supplement the RISP model by considering information overload as the vast volume and the incredulous quality of information in the COVID-19 pandemic challenge individuals' information acquisition and processing. Using a stratified demographic sample of news consumers of a federal German state (N = 1,000), we empirically examined the proposed model, answered the research question, and tested our hypotheses using structural equation modeling. The results reveal information avoidance among one-third of the respondents. They avoided online sources, including online-mediated interpersonal sources, more often than interpersonal sources and traditional mass media. Information avoidance was linked to more negative attitudes toward seeking and negative affective risk responses, more pronounced descriptive and injunctive avoidance norms, and perceived information overload. Attitudes and information overload were the most influential predictors of avoidance. In contrast, risk perception and information insufficiency were not associated with information avoidance. This study provides insights into theory development, contributes to the information behavior literature, and identifies barriers to communication during health crises.
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