Different Social Media Role in Public Agenda Setting Under The Context of COVID-19 Between China and the United Kingdom

Abstract

How does social media influence public agenda setting, and is the control of the COVID-19 closely related to the cooperation of social media? Understanding the usage of social media on real news to help regulate public agenda setting and policy has been the major concern of a large number of research papers. Because of different national conditions, it causes various circumstances when people use social media. Regarding the outbreak and spread of COVID-19, the situation of controlling the epidemic varies from country to country. China is one of the countries with better COVID-19 control, in which social media has played a great role at that moment. Besides, this study uses quantitative methods and aims at establishing the link between the countries, such as the United Kingdom and China, addressing public agenda setting in social media content. According to the data of relevant annual reports from social media companies, this paper reveals that people in the United Kingdom and China use social media to grab news of COVID-19 during the epidemic, but they depend on social media to varying degrees. In China, people rely more on social media to get news about COVID-19, and it helps them to control the epidemic. In addition, British people do not rely on social media for epidemic news as much as Chinese people do. Thus, this affects whether the governments should cooperate with social media and formulate relevant public agenda setting to control the epidemic through communication. The contribution of the present research involving social media may overturn the traditional way of conveying news and public policies. Social media can be used as a new medium to express and exchange news or people’s feelings, thus the governments may use it to help their country to effectively push public agenda setting for their citizens.