The Communication Analysis Of American Political Rumors After Sep.11 Terrorist Attack

From perspective of a social cognition theory, this thesis studied the two famous American political rumors after Sep. 11 terrorist attack respectively based on two aspects: environment and human social cognition. The study emphasizes on the reasons and motivations of the rumors'birth and communication, and then further exploring the connotation and extension of political rumors'communication.The first rumor involves the claim that on the day of attack, Arab-Americans publicly engaged in celebration. The other is about a (male) terrorist warns his American girlfriend to stay away from the Twin Towers on Sep. 11 or to avoid some other locations. They are both well-known and show how Americans came to understand terrorists.First, People's cognition of rumor and its communication cannot live without the influence of environment, which does not only refer to current circumstances but also latent context. The birth and communication of rumors are influenced by the interaction of both two environments. The current circumstance is a direct stimulating variable acting as an activator or fuse, while the latent context indirectly influences people's way of thinking which is constantly repeated and enforced in the international crisis.Second, it is related to people's cognition process. The motivation of individual psychology in the international crisis gives birth to rumors so as to release the tension and worry of the time. The features of mass psychology widely open a strobe for rumors and make them spread fast. They are composed as the intrinsic system of the birth and communication of rumors, which in all is the outcome of interaction between environments and human social cognition.Based the study above, we find the communication of rumors have profound connotation and extension. It reflects people's cognitive dilemma in the international crisis on the one hand, and on the anther, it also establishes the ideology of American majority and constructs the special value system in the international crisis in a sense. Furthermore, it implies the multicultural inconsistency and inharmonic ethnic relationship in American society.