International Journal of Communication Publishes a Special Section on COVID-19, Digital Media, and Health

What role do and did digital media play in individuals’ health during the COVID-19 pandemic? And vice versa, what impact does or did individuals’ health have on their digital media use in pandemic times?

Guest-edited by Kathrin Karsay, Anne-Linda Camerini, and Jörg Matthes, this Special Section on COVID-19, Digital Media, and Health addresses the role of digital media as an information source, a tool for emotional expression, and, consequently, a determinant of psychological and social well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic. It includes six articles covering research data from the United States, Ireland, the Netherlands, and South Korea. As such, the authors provide diverse and rich perspectives on the correlations of COVID-19, digital media, and health. The theoretical and empirical contributions provide lessons for research on digital media and health in a pandemic—but also beyond. We conclude that the pandemic has provided an impetus for reflection within the discipline and call for renewed focus on theory building as well as longitudinal, multi-data, multi-platform, and multi-method designs.

We invite you to read these articles that published in the International Journal of Communication on January 10, 2023. Please log into ijoc.org to read the papers of interest. We look forward to your feedback! 

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COVID-19, Digital Media, and Health: Lessons Learned and the Way Ahead for the Study of Human Communication—Introduction
Kathrin Karsay, Anne-Linda Camerini, Jörg Matthes

Communicating About Mental Health During a Pandemic: An Examination of Active and Aware Publics on Twitter
Jesse King, Audrey Halversen, Olivia Morrow, Whitney Westhoff, Pamela Brubaker

Health Messaging and Social Media: An Examination of Message Fatigue, Race, and Emotional Outcomes Among Black Audiences
Hope Hickerson, David Stamps 

Children’s and Parents’ Worries About Online Schooling Associated With Children’s Anxiety During Lockdown in Ireland
Derek A. Laffan, Seffetullah Kuldas, Beatrice Sciacca, James O’Higgins Norman, Tijana Milosevic

Beliefs in Times of Corona: Investigating the Relationship Between Media Use and COVID-19 Conspiracy Beliefs Over Time in a Representative Dutch Sample
Marloes van Wezel, Emiel Krahmer, Ruben Vromans, Nadine Bol 

Exposure to COVID-19 Misinformation Across Instant Messaging Apps: Moderating Roles of News Media and Interpersonal Communication      
Woohyun Yoo, Sang-Hwa Oh, Doo-Hun Choi 

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Larry Gross, Editor 
Kady Bell-Garcia, Managing Editor
Chi Zhang, Managing Editor, Special Sections
Kathrin Karsay, Anne-Linda Camerini, and Jörg Matthes, Guest Editors

Please note that according to the latest Google Scholar statistics, IJoC ranks 9th among all Humanities journals and 9th among all Communications journals in the world — demonstrating the viability of open access scholarly publication at the highest level.