Communication of risks: Spirals of fear around the washout of Quilloturo de Baños de Agua Santa (Ecuador)
Abstract
Risk communication has undergone variations in its form and design and broadcasting protocols, entrusting its function to actors emerging from digital platforms. Information and immediacy no longer belong to those who have the mission to manage it responsibly, appearing in the social media ecosystem collective communication phenomena driven by social dialogue and emotional contagion. The present study identifies the emergence of spirals of fear around digital publications about the landslide in the community of Quilloturo, parish of Río Verde in the canton of Baños de Agua Santa in Ecuador. Using a social listening tool, the conversations that circulated about the natural phenomenon were monitored, determining insights, terms of reference and feelings that emerge from the publications. Risk is perceived by the base terms and data used in the publications, also the components of fear spirals appear in the sentiments emitted in digital publications. It is possible that journalists are becoming specialists in the routinization of unpredictability with the contribution of social actors on the web that emit content. Such action implies that informative discourses are configuring emotions in the digital that can generate psychoemotional affectations.
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