A Study On Factors Influencing Risk Information Sharing About Food Safety On Social Media

Social media information sharing research is the continuation and development of the research tradition of information diffusion in the popular social media environment.Food Safety is related to individuals’ health and public safety.It is the focus of public issues that the whole society pays close attention to.At present,China’s food safety problems crop here and there,and have a profound impact on individual health and safety,consumer behavior,the trust on the media and government agencies,the orderly development of the food industry,and social harmony.The governance of food safety issues is of necessity and urgency.At the same time,in an era when social media has become the main channel to information of netizens,food safety issues are more complex than in the past: social media has become a soil for the revelations of food safety incidents and public opinion development,network events are prone to happen;information Sharing on social media brings about opportunities to promote risk management and response,as well as the challenge of managing popular and false information.Therefore,understanding why the public is sharing food safety risk information on social media is conducive to tackling food safety issues in the age of social media.It is a question worth studying.This study focuses on the specificity of food safety risk information sharing on the social media.On this basis,it explores the individual subjective factors and risk context factors that affect the public’s intention to share.Based on the perspective of Social Cognition Theory,this study combines the specificity of food safety risk information sharing in the social media era,focusing on the individual subjective factors of coping and disposing risk,the risk context factors of food safety risks and the public and non-public sharing intention of food safety risk information.Based on the existing research,hypotheses are established between risk situation factors,individual subjective factors and behavioral intentions,and a structural equation model is constructed.Sample data was collected by questionnaire survey,and the model evaluation and hypothesis verification were performed using SmartPLS software.The main findings were as following:(1)The whole model presents the influence mechanism of “risk situation factor→personal subjective factor→risk information sharing intention”.Specifically,risk negative emotion has significantly influence on information seeking,emotion regulation,altruism and communal risk outcome expectation.Public sharing intention of risk information is significantly positively impacted by information seeking,emotion regulation,and altruism outcome expectations,while communal risk outcome expectation have no significant effect on it.Non-public sharing intention of risk information is significantly positively affected by emotion regulation,altruism,and communal risk outcome expectations,while information seeking results outcome expectation has no significant effect on it.(2)Risk information sharing is not only an information behavior,but individuals also regard it as a risk-protective behavior.Individuals expect to reduce their own,other,and public food safety risks by sharing information,and these outcome expectations motivate their risk information sharing intentions.(3)The attribute of risk information public sharing is different from the attribute of non-public sharing.Public sharing is both self-oriented and altruistic,while non-public sharing is a kind of expression with strong prosociality.(4)Negative emotions have outstanding performance in promoting individual risk decision-making.Negative emotions on food safety risks enhance the intention to adopt risk-protective behaviors by strengthening the rational expectations of individuals to reduce themselves,others and public risks,and have positive significance for risk disposing and prevention.Based on the research discoveries,this paper puts forward practical suggestions for the food safety risk communication work of government departments.First,we must fully understand the positive role of risk information sharing and guide users to normal information sharing.Second,we must provide sufficient official information to meet the public’s need to reduce risks,while also preventing the malignant behavior of using the anxiety and anger of the public to fabricate rumors and make public opinion chaotic.