Citizen journalism practices during COVID-19 in

spotlight: influence of user-generated contents

about economic policies in perceiving
government performance
Syed Hassan Raza
Department of Communication Studies, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan, Pakistan
Ogadimma C. Emenyeonu
Faculty College of Communication, University of Sharjah, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates
Muhammad Yousaf
Centre for Media and Communication Studies, University of Gujrat, Gujrat, Pakistan, and
Moneeba Iftikhar
Department of Mass Communication, Lahore College for Women University, Lahore, Pakistan

Abstract
Purpose – Citizen journalism practices through social networking sites are increasingly becoming an imperative source of public opinion formation.
Given the increase in the volume of information sharing on social media during COVID-19, this study aims to grasp the largely unknown interaction
of the individual’s trust in citizen journalism practices and public perception formulation. Drawing on this idea, the study has twofold objectives:
first, to examine the influence of user-generated information about economic policies of government during COVID-19 as the antecedent of public
perception about government performance and second, to identify the moderating role of trust in citizen journalism practices during COVID-19
through social networking sites.
Design/methodology/approach – The study used a survey method and a sample of 464 adults were collected through an online administrated
questionnaire.
Findings – The findings specify that user-generated content that is pro-government economic policies during COVID-19 positively influenced the
perception of government performance. On the other hand, user-generated information that criticized government economic policies had a negative
influence on public perception.
Originality/value – This study seeks to intensify the understudied phenomenon of how nature and source of the information could interact to
influence one’s information processing during a crisis such as pandemic COVID-19. Furthermore, only a little research has been conducted in this
area focusing on two mechanisms, namely; citizen journalism and trust in social media user-generated information about prevailing economic
insecurities during crisis provided through citizen journalism.
Keywords Trust, Social media, Fake news, User-generated content, COVID-19, Citizen journalism
Paper type Research paper

1. Introduction
With the emergence of new media, social networking sites
(henceforth SNS) usage became widespread (Ahmed et al.,
2020a, 2020b; Liao et al., 2018). New media platforms have
provided a shared media sphere such as SNS (Singer, 2014)
where people can connect (Li and Das, 2020; Phua et al., 2017)
and interact (Ellison et al., 2014) with one another. To this end,
SNS (e.g. Facebook, Twitter) have allowed people to
interconnect through communicative spaces (Kim, 2016).
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald
Insight at: https://www.emerald.com/insight/2398-6247.htm
Albeit SNS have been extensively used for connecting people
(Joo and Teng, 2017) but participatory web phenomenon such
as generating and sharing contents has diverse facades, for
instance, seeking information (Charitidis et al., 2020; Silver
and Matthews, 2017) political awareness (Reuter and
Szakonyi, 2015) and activism (Antony and Thomas, 2010). In
this case, undoubtedly, the user-generated content (henceforth
UGC) landscape touches every aspect of our socio-economic,
political and cultural lives (Naab and Sehl, 2017).
Communication scholars have identified several corollaries
of UGC, which include audience involvement (Östman, 2012),
citizen journalism (Kaufhold et al., 2010) and the gratification
perspective of UGC (Shao, 2009). Others have measured the

Received 25 September 2020

Information Discovery and Delivery Revised 26 January 2021
© Emerald Publishing Limited [ISSN 2398-6247] 1 March 2021
[DOI 10.1108/IDD-09-2020-0118] Accepted 5 March 2021
 Citizen journalism practices
Syed Hassan Raza et al.
effects of UGC such as political attitudes (Lee, 2014), political
knowledge (Östman, 2012), impact on trust (Zhu et al., 2020)
and political trust (Ceron, 2015). However, most of the studies
are of the view that the interactive nature of SNS provides room
for an outright new style of communication that facilitates
citizen journalism practices such as the production of UGC and
information sharing (Hermida, 2013). This diverse
functioning, in turn, has unveiled new communication-
activated behaviors such as opinion formation in response to
citizen journalism (Chen et al., 2020; Firmstone and Coleman,
2015). For instance, when people are exposed to content
delineating government economic policies, it may affect their
opinions depending on the level of trust in the UGC.
Literature is replete with studies that underscored the users’
perspective of the internet or online news sites (Ceron, 2015).
For instance, some studies have examined the credibility of
some components of the internet such as blogs (Kim, 2012)
and issue-oriented sites (Johnson and Kaye, 2014). Even more,
few scholars such as Ardèvol-Abreu et al. (2017) studied the
trust in citizen journalism practices (henceforth TCJP)
regarding user’s online participation. To our knowledge, no
study has explored the mechanism delineating TCJP on SNS
during a crisis such as COVID-19. Consequently, the lacuna
that this study seeks to fill is: how much do users trust citizen
journalism practices (e.g. information shared online by their
counterparts) during a crisis such as COVID-19? This is an
imperative question leaning on two facades: one, a source must
be arbitrated as trustworthy to be relied on and second, the
perception of individuals about the practices of citizen
journalism on SNS during the pandemic.
Carr et al. (2014) noted that the impact of user-generated
information (henceforth UGI) depends on the level of TCJP.
Regardless of the perceived TCJP, past research studies have
highlighted other issues that are also likely to determine the
effectiveness of citizen journalism such as slant of content
(Ahmed et al., 2020a, 2020b; Li, 2020; Silver and Matthews,
2017) and the issue under question (Johnson and Kaye, 2014).
To exemplify this in the present study, users of SNS who read
online contents that predict the ambiguous economic situation
during COVID-19 may be influenced positively based on
economic uncertainty during a crisis. This, in turn, may
increase the level of involvement and intensify the effects of
UGI. This raises a question about how the nature and source of
the content interaction could affect one’s information
processing during the pandemic COVID-19. In this study, we
argue that despite abundant literature on citizen journalism
(Kim, 2012; Antony and Thomas, 2010) and trust in social
media content (Ceron, 2015; Carr et al., 2014) little research
has studied these two mechanisms jointly in the context of UGI
on prevailing economic insecurities during crisis provided
through citizen journalism. Thus, it becomes timely and
pertinent to study UGI about the economy, in our case, how
Pakistanis perceive citizen journalism practices during a crisis
and to what extent they rely on them.
To theoretically bridge this gap, we propose a model based
on the Elaboration Likelihood Model (henceforth ELM) (Petty
and Cacioppo, 1986) and Prospect Theory (Tversky and
Kahneman, 1981) to understand how the level of TCJP during
COVID-19 drives the influences of UGC among Pakistanis.
The ELM is apt in this study as it helps in explaining how
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individuals process the UGI provided on these communicative
spaces (i.e. Facebook, Twitter) and how they influence their
perceiving government performance (henceforth PGP) during
COVID-19. This aligns with ELM’s position on the
interdependence of communication contents and perception
(Campbell, 2015). Further, the proposed model treats trust as
a moderator of UGI (e.g. information about economic policies
during COVID-19) and perception of government
performance. This is in line with prospect theory which
assumes that individuals’ decisions rely on the level of source
credibility (Jones et al., 2003) and message framing (Bassett-
Gunter et al., 2013). Based on the foregoing narrative, this
study will advance computer-mediated communication
literature by testing the interactional effect of UGC with TCJP
in times of crisis such as COVID-19, thus determining public
opinion.
2. Literature review
2.1 Implications of COVID-19 on the economy and
public concerns
The outbreak of COVID-19 was declared Public Health
Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) on 30 January
2020 by the World Health Organization (WHO). As the
outbreak spread across the entire world, (nearly 213 nations
have been affected) WHO declared it a pandemic (Lango,
2020). The aftermath of COVID-19 has revealed severe
consequences over the globe on many facades especially the
economy, health and social sectors (He et al., 2021; Ahmed
et al., 2020a, 2020b). Owing to the rapid spread of and to
contain COVID-19 infection, almost all nations locked or
restricted their services, amenities, institutions, manufacturing
sectors, markets and other businesses (De Massis and Rondi,
2020). The lockdown, for sure, negatively affected all kinds of
businesses and commercial activities and certainly has slowed
down global economic activities (Kok and Woo, 2021). Many
people have either lost their jobs or remained under stress due
to uncertain and ambiguous economic situations (Chen et al.,
2020). It is no gain-saying that this impacted the social life of
people all over the world and their economic issues have
become more critical than before (Pre-COVID-19). In
response, many governments initiated palliative measures to
curtail the adverse economic impacts of COVID-19 on
common people (Morgan et al., 2021). Therefore, the issue of
government economic policies during COVID-19 attained
public attention (Godinic et al., 2020). Owing to the COVID-
19 implications including those on the economy, people
became more interested in relevant (economic) informational
contents available on digital media platforms (Chen et al.,
2020). The current study underpins the implications of UGI’s
produced during the COVID-19 through citizen journalism
practice and is explained later in the study.
2.2 Theoretical framework and hypothesis development
The ELM presents the assumptions related to several
interconnected constructs that may affect an individual’s
impetus and ability to elaborate on the persuasive message
(Petty and Cacioppo, 1986). Li (2013) noted that persuasive
arguments such as personal involvement, relevance, repetition
and affective state are determinants of persuasion outcomes.
 Citizen journalism practices
Syed Hassan Raza et al.
The information process presupposes that the individual
cautiously scrutinizes and appraises information based on their
prior knowledge, experience, as well as source attributes
(Casalo et al., 2015). Hence, the attributes of the source used in
presenting the argument are an imperative variable involved in
the persuasive process (Leong et al., 2019). For instance, the
credibility of the news source may result in lead to low
elaboration. The mathematical prescription for the
underpinning ELM (adopted from Hamilton et al., 1993) is
given in equation (1). This suggests that persuasion would be a
function of the locus supported by the credible information
source (cm) and response to the cues (s), perception variation
from pre-message (a1) to post-message (a2) is represented as
follows :a2 – a, with a as an impact of information parameter:
a2
a1 ¼ ascm (1)
The ELM posits that information processing impacts can be
evoked owing to the trustworthiness of the source (Chang et al.,
2020). “Equation (1)” represents this multiplier that integrates
this prediction (Hamilton et al., 1993). Therefore, information
yields the same process of evaluation and information receivers
vigorously engender judgments based on source
trustworthiness. According to ELM, individuals must hold
adequate motivation attained as a result of contemplations
about the merits (source credibility) of given information
(Casalo et al., 2015; Cartwright and Opree, 2016). Stream of
literature has validated that source attributes (i.e. credibility)
have a positive effect on the extent of attention to a persuasive
message (Zhou, 2012). Therefore, it is believed that
information received from a credible source results in low
elaboration likelihood. This, in turn, positively influences the
acceptance of given information (Kerr et al., 2015).
On the other hand, Tversky and Kahneman’s (1981)
prospect theory explains that individuals react differently to
given messages, based on how these messages are framed
(Tannenbaum et al., 2015; Chung and Koo, 2015; Bassett-
Gunter et al., 2013). The prospect theory has prevailed the
investigations of individuals’ judgment formed under risk
(Tannenbaum et al., 2015). It has been widely recognized as a
descriptive model of explaining economic behaviors. The
theory postulates that one’s judgment under risky situations
can be regarded as a choice between prospects (Tversky and
Kahneman, 1981)). The prospect (x, p; 0, 1
p) is a pact that
yields consequence x with likelihood Pi, where Pl 1 P2 1 . . . =
1 which yields x with likelihood p and 0 with likelihood 1
p.
Hence, the UGI about government policies during COVID-19
delineating the economic benefits or delineating risk to the
economy during COVID-19 may have different implications in
PGP during the same period. In this scenario, the study follows
the parameters [Equation (2)] offered in prospect theory
axiom:
p ð pÞ > vð pxÞ=v ðxÞ (2)
According to this theory, perceptions about risks (p ) are
determined mutually by benefits (v) and not exclusively by the
benefits. It is, thus, informative to observe the circumstances
under which risks aversions or are likely to happen as seen in
this study – UGI delineating benefits (x, p) and its anticipated
Information Discovery and Delivery
perception (px). If x > 0, UGI about the risk to the economy is
inferred when p (p)>v(px)/v(x), which is higher than “p” if the
perception for benefits is concave. Thus, overweighting
(p (p) > p) is indispensable but not adequate for perception as
the result of economic benefits in UGI. Precisely, the same
condition is indispensable but not adequate for risk to economy
presented in UGI when x< 0. For this reason, researchers using
prospect theory’s assumption have reported, sometimes, the
negative outcomes of failing to adhere to certain behaviors
(Jones et al., 2003; Bassett-Gunter et al., 2013). However, in
most cases, they reported that individuals rely on risk-related
information while making judgments. In the case of the current
study, messages with negative information may be perceived
positively based on a risk-related issue of the economy. For
instance, UGI that informs people about the ambiguous
economic situation during COVID-19 would be perceived as a
risk-averse framed message and may become more effective in
forming one’s perception.
To this end, we argue that integrating the ELM and Prospect
theory in the context of trust in the source and the effect of
message framing during COVID-19 would provide valuable
theoretical interpretations. Thus, these theories examined the
potential tradeoff effect of trust on the source and message
framing during COVID-19 (e.g. information about economic
policies during COVID-19), to determine the perception of
individuals on government performance during COVID-19.
Based on the views of prospect theory and ELM, this study
proposes a conceptual model (Figure 1) in which TCJP and
UGI (framed as clear or ambiguous economic policies during
COVID-19) interact in determining individuals’ perceptions of
government performance during COVID-19. For instance,
given that user-generated messages containing facts about
ambiguous economic policies may be perceived as risk-averse
factors, which, in turn, increase the level of concerns, we
nonetheless argue that positive frames (good economic
policies) would be more effective in PGP during COVID-19
because the individual’s focus would be on improvements
rather than failures due to economic policies.
2.3 User-generated contents and public perception
UGC is any kind of content produced by the user of free
communicative spaces (i.e. online platforms or SNS), made
accessible publicly (Singer, 2014). It is a form of citizen
journalism that provides an alternate standpoint (Silver and
Figure 1 Conceptual model of TCJP during COVID-19
 Citizen journalism practices
Syed Hassan Raza et al.
Matthews, 2017). For this study, we operationalize UGC as
communication content created by users to provide
information about the economic situations prevailing in the
country and shared by SNS users during COVID-19. Past
research studies have demonstrated that UGCs have a strong
impact on political awareness (Silver and Matthews, 2017),
political activism (Antony and Thomas, 2010), involvement
(Östman, 2012) and on political decisions of individuals (Naab
and Sehl, 2017). Other studies on citizen journalism have
concentrated on its significance for political outcomes such as
political knowledge, trust and attitudes (Schaffner and Roche,
2016; Lee, 2014; Ceron, 2015).
When it comes to information on the economy, it has always
been a relevant topic for people and more so for the people of
developing countries such as Pakistan. Campbell (2015) for
instance, identified public interest in economic news on SNS
that convey information about the trends of the economy.
Furthermore, Kalogeropoulos et al. (2017) found that
economic news can have an impact on the evaluation of
government performance. Considering the above, it is quite
clear that UGI is a predictor of people’s perception. However,
to date, no citizen journalism study has directly measured the
individual’s PGP during a crisis. To fill this gap, this study has
selected two variables: UGI about good and ambiguous
economic policies of government during COVID-19. The
variables were selected to reinforce the assumption that citizen
journalism practices in form of UGC’s have, certainly, an
influence on public perception. Consistent with prospect
theory, we assumed that the framing of issues would determine
the direction of UGC on individuals’ evaluation about
government performance and hypothesize that:
H1(A). UGI about good economic policies of the
government (henceforth UGG) would have a
positive influence on the PGP during COVID-19.
Though some studies have indicated that the nature of
economic news is also a strong predictor of personal economic
expectations, recent literature suggests that connecting
economic information to personal economics can have a strong
effect on individual perceptions (Hamari et al., 2016). In the
context of citizen journalism, Lee (2014) noted that it can also
be more effective in an environment in which individuals are
exposed to politically biased media. In consonance with this
idea, we expect that in a country like Pakistan where individuals
perceive the media as less credible (Shim et al., 2015) reliance
on citizen journalism as an outlet for providing alternate views
may increase or improve an individual’s involvement (on
economic issues) during COVID-19. Therefore, drawing on
Kalogeropoulos et al. (2017) idea that negative information has
a greater influence on individuals’ judgments, we hypothesize:
H1(B). UGI about ambiguous economic policies of the
government (henceforth UGA) would have a
negative influence on the PGP during COVID-19.
2.4 Trust in citizen journalism practices and COVID-19
Citizen journalism is branded as a “public” or “participatory”
form of journalism, whereby “public” or “citizens” involve
actively in the process of gathering, producing and consuming
Information Discovery and Delivery
news or information (Campbell, 2015; Wall, 2015). For
Radsch (2016), citizen journalism leverages interactive media
and operates separately but concerning conventional media. In
a different perspective, citizen journalism denotes a precise
form of both citizen media and UGC and is regarded as the
practice of participatory journalism (Carlson, 2018; Wall,
2015). Scholars (Radsch, 2016; Kaufhold et al., 2010;
Hermida, 2011) argue that citizen journalism is a better term to
use when UGC on social media is in question. On the other
hand, to authenticate the trustworthiness of news, people select
different online media platforms to get varied interpretations of
news (Campbell, 2015; Fletcher and Park, 2017).
Consumption of news from information/news websites is
related to higher TCJP (Elvestad et al., 2018). It is also believed
that TCJP is directly related to public perception (Ardèvol-
Abreu et al., 2017; Park, 2017). To exemplify this, if people
have trust in citizen journalistic practices, their opinions and
perceptions become reliant on online content.
Stream of literature (Campbell, 2015; Firmstone and
Coleman, 2015) suggests that citizen journalism practices
become more frequent in times of crisis. In crisis
circumstances, the public try to browse and search alternate
sources to seek information about the issues of public interest
such as the economy and public health. Thus, the emergence of
citizen journalism has developed a neo surveillance system
(Wall, 2015; Kaufhold, 2010) which, most likely, is activated at
times of crisis such as COVID-19 when individuals are in need/
pursuit of information. Recent studies have affirmed that more
UGI (citizen journalism practices) have been disseminated via
SNN’s about COVID-19’s implications on different public
interest issues-particularly the economy (Chen et al., 2020).
The amplified frequency of the issues and nature of the crisis
based on its potential to harm the general public raised more
concerns. Hence, UGI describing the economic policies of the
government on SNS by citizens get public attention.
Assumedly, COVID-19 is generally perceived as a potential
threat to “economic survival” across the globe. Thus, contents
containing economic prospects may appear relevant to the
Pakistani public, wherein, people are already struggling with
economic situations. In this scenario, UGI may influence the
perception of an individual, but this is dependent on the level of
trust in the citizen journalism practices.
This underlying mechanism is broadly similar to the prospect
theory which posits that negative or risk-oriented information
may appeal or affect the individuals’ perceptions. An
implication of this, particularly in a crisis like COVID-19, is
that negative news about the economic policies of the
government may pose a threat to the economic survival of
individuals. This, in principle, can contribute to the escalation
of their concerns about government performance. In line with
(ELM), when such information comes from a perceived
credible source, elaboration may get activated to invoke
attention and bring about a greater understanding of the
argument provided and finally, create stronger perpetual effects
(Leong et al., 2019).
In sum, this study expects that the effects of exposure to
alternate sources of information such as UGI may vary
(Firmstone and Coleman, 2015). People who find positive
information on the economy and perceive citizen journalism as
a credible source of information would express more message
 Citizen journalism practices
Syed Hassan Raza et al.
elaboration relative to those who have less trust. Similarly,
people who find negative information on the economy and have
TCJP would also express more message elaboration relative to
those who have less trust. Finally, we assume that the level of
TCJP would also determine the strength of the relationship
between UGI in both ambiguous and good economic
conditions with the perception of government performance.
This is in line with ELM which suggests that the
trustworthiness of the information source functions strengthens
the influence of the information on receivers (Leong et al.,
2019). The source trustworthiness facilitates perception
development by refining attention and comprehension
(Cartwright and Opree, 2016). Increased comprehension of
the arguments presented in information acts to strengthen the
subjective probability lead toward the acceptance of the
arguments as accurate. Literature affirms that even if no
argument is present in the information, perception alteration
may still happen if the source of information has higher
trustworthiness (Casalo et al., 2015; Leong et al., 2019). This
phenomenon of perception formation based on the deliberation
of source trustworthiness cues alone is acknowledged in the
information processing research as “prestige suggestion” and,
thus, we hypothesize that:
H3. TCJP during COVID-19 would moderate the
relationship between UGI about good economic
policies of the government (UGA) and PGP.
H4. TCJP during COVID-19 would moderate the
relationship between UGI about ambiguous economic
policies of the government (UGA) and PGP during
COVID-19.
3. Methods
3.1 Design, sample and procedure
In conducting this study, a survey method was used using a cross-
sectional design. Data was collected from the sample (n = 464)
which consisted of adults between 19 and 41 years. Before the
main survey, items were validated by experts in the fields of
economics, political science and journalism to ensure the face
validity of the items in the context of Pakistan as measures were
previously used in the western context as recommended (Hinkin,
1998). This was followed by the pilot study. The main online
survey was conducted by using Google Forms. The form was
disseminated on SNS pages and forums dedicated to discussions
on current affairs (i.e. economics and politics).
In using an online survey, the study has attempted to access
the genuine responses of the social media users as were desired.
Demographically, most of them were employees working in
different organizations (56%), students (32%) and private
business owners (12%). The sample was also found ethnically
diverse and somewhat close to the demographic greasepaint of
Pakistani society. It consisted of 69% Punjabis; 12% Pashtuns;
9% Sindhi; 2% Balochi and 8% others.
3.2 Measures
3.2.1 User-generated information: Good economic policies
This study measured the UGI about good economic policies
UGG by using the scale adopted from Graefe et al. (2016)
Information Discovery and Delivery
These items (see Appendix) comprise three imperative issues
for measuring the response of participants to the online-
contents in the context of this study, namely, expertise,
credibility and readability. For this study, we have rephrased
the three-items to measure the UGG to ascertain participants’
responses to information on good economic policies.
3.2.2 User-generated information: Ambiguous economic policies
This study measured the UGI about ambiguous economic
policies UGA by using the scale adopted from Graefe et al.
(2016). Like the UGG scale, three issues, expertise credibility
and readability were used for UGA (see Appendix). We
rephrased the three-items to measure the UGA to ascertain
participants’ responses to the ambiguous economic policies
information.
3.2.3 Trust in citizen journalism practices
We measured the TCJP by using the scale adopted from
Kohring and Matthes (2007) with four-items drawn from the
wider original 16-items. These items comprise four imperative
issues for measuring “trust” in the context of this study,
namely, selection of issue, facts, accurate depiction and
journalistic assessment (see Appendix). Hill et al. (2012) have
also used a similar four-item scale for measuring trust in the
context of political media consumption.
3.2.4 Perception of government performance during COVID-19
Furthermore, we measured the PGP three-items (seven-point
Likert scales) having endpoints “1 strongly disagree and 7
strongly agree” (see Appendix). These items tap three
imperative issues such as perception based on UGI for
measuring the PGP during COVID-19.
4. Data analysis
Before inferential and validity analysis, descriptive analysis on
SPSS was carried out to observe normality. The analysis
outliers (univariate, bivariate and multivariate) were
conducted. To attain normality, 21 cases were removed which
is less than 15% recommended cut-off for deletions of the
cases. Afterward, data revealed normality based on the visual
screening (histogram and Q-Q plots) along with normal values
of the Skewness and Kurtosis values of the recommended
normality test and visual inspections of all constructs after
deleting the outliers. Further analysis proceeded with n = 443
after deletion of the 21 cases to attain normality. The
correlations among UGA, UGG, TCJP during COVID-19 and
PGP variables are given in Table 1. The results highlighted that
the relationship between all four endogenous variables involved
in the study was significant. We adopted the Exploratory Factor
Analysis (henceforth EFA) on segregated data for checking
sample adequacy as recommended by Green et al. (2016). This
was done by using segregated data instead of using the same
data set in EFA and CFA. Results of EFA revealed reasonable
values of the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin along with significant
Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity.
4.1 Partial least squares path modeling on advanced
analysis of composites (ADANCO)
Partial least squares path modeling (PLS-PM) is a kind of
structural equation modeling (henceforth SEM) technique that
 Citizen journalism practices Information Discovery and Delivery
Syed Hassan Raza et al.

Table 1 Correlation and descriptive statistics
Variable Mean SD UGA UGG TCJP PGP
UGA 2.89 0.77 1 below 10. The item-wise variance inflation factor VIF is

UGG 4.89 0.57 0.42 1 obtainable in Table 3.
 
TCJP 3.68 0.59 0.62 0.26 1 Further, the ADANCO parameter estimates were used to
  
PGP 3.73 0.66 0.54 0.47 0.67 1 measure the average variance extracted (AVE). Results showed
Notes: User-generated information: ambiguous economic policies (UGA),
user-generated information: good economic policies (UGG), trust in citizen
journalism practices (TCJP), perception of government performance (PGP)
and  p < 0.05
has been developed and considered as one of the most reliable
techniques in behavioral research. SEM was used in the
analysis for reasons that it is competent to test model latent
constructs; it considers numerous procedures of measurement
error; it is suitable for the exploratory studies and it tests the
whole predictive model at once. For these reasons, Hair et al.
(2014) noted that it is an improved method than using
regression. Further, according to Henseler et al. (2014) and
Henseler, Hubona and Ray (2016) using the variance-based
(henceforth VB-SEM) method is appropriate when the
presumed model includes composites. The PLS-PM on
ADANCO is considered a better statistical tool among other
VB- SEM methods (Henseler, 2017).
Henseler et al. (2016) recommend that the estimations of
PLS-PM parameters involve four stages: first, determining the
composite score of the variables; second, dropping of the items
if required to attain model fit; third, validity and reliability
assessment; and finally, bootstrapping estimation to test
hypotheses. These four stages were followed and reported in
this study. The model fit estimations of the measurement
model on the ADANCO include four variables UGA, UGG,
TCJP and PGP. By using PLS-PM these variables highlighted
the adequate model fitness based on parameters such as
SRMR = 0.196 with H95 = 0.178, dULS = 2.21 and dG = 2.38.
One item of TCJP was removed to reach model fitness.
4.2 Reliability and parameter estimation
The PLS-PM estimates indicated that all UGA, UGG,
TCJPand PGP variables were within the adequate reliability
estimates such as s Dijkstra-Henseler’s rho ( r A), Jöreskog’s rho
( r c) and Cronbach’s alpha(a) (Table 2). These newly multiple
indices of measuring reliability introduced in ADANCO can
give a more valid depiction of the construct level reliability
(Henseler et al., 2016).
4.3 Validities and heterotrait ratio of correlations
Additionally, in estimating the multicollinearity among the
UGA, UGG, TCJP and PGP variables, ADANCO estimates
were used as recommended by Henseler et al. (2016). The
variance inflation factor (henceforth VIF) value was calculated
for all indicators which showed satisfaction as VIF ranged well
that values for all UGA, UGG, TCJP and PGP variables were
above the acceptable threshold (0.5) of (AVE) as
recommended by Hair et al. (2014).
Thus, the four variables after deleting one item from the
TCJP variable revealed convergent validity as presented in
Table 4. For item loadings of each construct see Table 5.
The HTMT procedure can measure discriminant validity as
noted by Henseler et al. (2016). We used the HTMT
procedure with (95%) of the bootstrapping quantile. The
HTMT analysis has verified discriminant validity as HTMT
values for each variable presented in Table 6 were found to be
significantly below (to) the highest threshold of (0.9).
Similarly, the Fornell-Larcker criterion-based (Henceforth
FLC) analysis of the discriminant validity also verified that all
UGA, UGG, TCJP and PGP variables were found within the
acceptable level of FLC recommended discriminant validity
values (Table 6).
4.4 Hypothesis testing
We used ADANCO to run partial least squares path modeling
(PLS-PM) for inferential analysis. The outcomes indicated that
H1 and H2 were supported. As H1 postulated that UGG would
have a direct relationship with PGP and analysis showed that
UGG positively influenced the PGP as ( b = 0.18) see Table 7
and Figure 2. The effect size was also verified by using Cohen’s
f2, for the H1, UGG has a moderate effect on PGP as (f2 =
0.31). Similarly, H2 postulated that UGA would have a direct
relationship with PGP and analysis highlighted that UGG
positively influenced the PGP as ( b = 0.22) and there was a
moderate effect size (f2 = 0.23) found for UGA that the UGG
ON PGP.
For moderation analysis, we adopted the Preacher et al.
(2007) approach by using two steps: first, we ran Model 1
(Table 7) in which the direct influence of moderating variable
TCJP was measured along with the influence of independent
variables UGG and UGA on the dependent variable PGP. In
this model (Figure 2) direct influence of TCJP was significant
( b = 0.29, R2 = 0.350). The R2 = 0.350 was obtained from
(1999) bootstrapping and five iterations suggested that 35% of
the variance was extracted for Model 1.
In the second step, we ran Model 2 (Table 7) by adding two
interaction terms TCJP X UGG and TCJP X UGA to examine
H3 and H4 to find out the moderating effect of TCJP. The R2 =
0.486 was obtained from (1999) bootstrapping and five

Table 2 Reliability estimates analysis

Variable Dijkstra-Henseler’s rho ( r A) Jöreskog’s rho ( r c) Cronbach’s alpha(a)
UGA 0.7411 0.8467 0.7305
UGG 0.7599 0.8574 0.7496
TCJP 0.7335 0.8400 0.7145
PGP 0.8903 0.9308 0.8885
 Citizen journalism practices Information Discovery and Delivery
Syed Hassan Raza et al.

Table 3 Multicollinearity: Variance inflation factors (VIF) strong effect size of (f2 = 0.46). Similarly, TCJP X UGA
interaction was proposed in H4, the results highlighted
Indicators UGA UGG TCJP PGP
(Table 7) that TCJP moderates the relationship between UGA
UGA 1 1.5521 and PGP as ( b = 0.16) with a moderate effect size of (f2 =
UGA 2 1.4075 0.29), and thus, H3 and H4 were supported.
UGA 3 1.4080 Furthermore, the slope test was also used to understand the
UGG 1 1.4405 TCJP X UGG and TCJP X UGA interactional pattern on the
UGG 2 1.9043 PGP during COVID-19. The slope test highlighted that TCJP
UGG 3 1.5268 strengthens the relationship of UGG and UGA with PGP. In
TCJP 1 1.3271 other words, TCJP is a crucial factor while individuals make
TCJP 2 1.6132 judgments such as perception about government performance
TCJP 3 1.4123 PGP in the case of UGI regarding good or ambiguous
TCJP4 1.5681 economic policies of the government during COVID-19. If an
PGP 1 2.4018 individual has more conviction on the practice of citizen
PGP 2 2.7027 journalism through SNS as a reliable source of information,
PGP 3 2.6734 there is the possibility of a stronger influence of the given
information.

Table 4 Convergent validity 5. Discussion and implications

Variable The average variance extracted (AVE) Overall, this study has highlighted the imperative role and the
UGA 0.6484
trust people had in citizen journalism practices through social
UGG 0.6681
media during COVID-19. UGI in the context of prevailing
TCJP 0.6374
economic conditions during COVID-19 was used to identify
PGP 0.8176
how the impact of issue framing is dependent on source
credibility during COVID-19. Further, a conceptual model
was proposed in this study by integrating two influential
theories – The ELM which explains how sources’ credibility
Table 5 Item loadings influences perception (Petty and Cacioppo, 1986); and
Indicators UGA UGG TCJP PGP prospect theory which posits that message framing matters in
defining the effect of media contents (Bassett-Gunter et al.,
UGA 1 0.8222
2013). The results of the PLS-SEM validate the proposed
UGA 2 0.7648
hypotheses which have some theoretical implications. For
UGA 3 0.8271
instance, analysis from ELM explains that the high trust in
UGG 1 0.7590
sources primes higher message elaboration than low trust in
UGG 2 0.8850
sources (Li, 2013; Kerr et al., 2015). The results were constant
UGG 3 0.8031
with propositions of ELM and Prospect theory as (Figures 3
TCJP 1 0.7462
and 4) effect for good economic policies messages during
TCJP 2 0.8687
COVID-19 and TCJP interacted to determine the public
TCJP 2 0.7751
 perception effect size.
TCJP4 0.4983
However, the positive moderating effect of TCJP in the case of
PGP 1 0.8950
the negative message (ambiguous economic policies) during
PGP 2 0.9137
COVID-19 has interesting implications. First, the high trust in
PGP 3 0.9039
online content is due to the exponential increase in dependence
Notes:  = Item deleted due to low loading on social media during times of crisis which is also contingent on
media dependency theory (henceforth MDT). The MDT posits
that people become more reliant on media sources including
iterations suggested that 49% of the variance was extracted for social media to seek information that is more important to them
Model 2. The TCJP X UGG interaction was proposed in H3, (Damstra et al., 2018). This assertion is also supported
the results highlighted (Table 7) that TCJP moderates the empirically in past studies (Ho et al., 2015) – that during crises
relationship between UGG and PGP as ( b = 0.34) with a such as COVID-19, people start trusting alternate informational

Table 6 Discriminant validity: heterotrait-monotrait ratio of correlations (HTMT) and Fornell-Larcker criterion (FLC)
PGP
Variable UGA HTMT UGG HTMT TCJP HTMT HTMT UGA FLC UGG FLC TCJP FLC PGP FLC
UGA 1 0.648
UGG 0.706 1 0.274 0.668
TCJP 0.841 0.668 1 0.382 0.238 0.637
PGP 0.619 0.542 0.651 1 0.255 0.198 0.273 0.817
 Citizen journalism practices Information Discovery and Delivery
Syed Hassan Raza et al.

Table 7 Direct and moderation effects analysis and results

Standard bootstrap results
Direct and interaction effects b S. E t-value p-value Cohen f2 Hypothesis
UGG fi PGP 0.22 0.063 3.632 0.000 0.31 H1 supported
UGA fi PGP 0.18 0.055 4.820 0.001 0.23 H2 supported
TCJP fi PGP 0.29 0.060 3.318 0.000 0.37
(UGG-X-TCJP)fiPGP 0.34 0.050 3.223 0.007 0.46 H3 supported
(UGA-X-TCJP)fiPGP 0.16 0.047 3.569 0.003 0.29 H4 supported
Model 1 Coefficient of determination (R2) 0.350
Model Adjusted R2 0.344
Model 2 Coefficient of determination (R2) 0.486
Model 2 Adjusted R2 0.474
Notes: User-generated information: ambiguous economic policies (UGA), user-generated information: good economic policies (UGG), trust in citizen
journalism practices (TCJP), perception of government performance (PGP), X interaction term and f2 = effect size

Figure 2 The direct effect of UGG, UGA, and TCJP on PGP

Figure 3 Moderation of TCJP improves the relationship between UGG and PGP

resources such as online media. However, some past studies have contents emanating from citizen journalism were not perceived as
a similar contrary opinion (Vosoughi et al., 2018; Elvestad et al., fake news among Pakistanis.
2018) as they argued that people perceived UGI as fake news and Second, the nature of the issue selected for this study –
do not trust them. In the context of our finding, this is not true as economic policies during COVID-19 played a role. Looking for
 Citizen journalism practices
Syed Hassan Raza et al.
Figure 4 Moderation of TCJP improves the relationship between UGA and PGP
information about economic initiatives substantially
contributed to the extreme use of online media. Both the
government and the citizens, thus, resorted to the massive use
of online media platforms in disseminating information
regarding economic insecurities in times of COVID-19. Given
the above, it can be concluded that most of the people in
Pakistan may take interest in the economic issues, this interest
dictates their opinions inwardly in line with the issues framed
by UGC available online.
Finally, the nature of online media platforms, where the
public not only can obtain news but also produce self-generated
contents and give open feedback contrary to what is obtainable
in traditional media, has contributed immensely to the rapid
growth of online sharing in Pakistan. This is a global
phenomenon as Silver and Matthews (2017) also found that
people are now using online media as a source of alternate
informational medium. Results of our study show that people
have some existing level of trust in UGI in Pakistan. Thus,
probably it serves as an antecedent of opinion formation. Also,
this study reveals that people showed an improved level of trust
and news verification of online content regarding the economic
situation during COVID-19. These results seem to agree with
the findings of past studies (Chen and Chang, 2017) which
noted that people make opinions based on UGC. Consistent
with MDT, the results of this study suggest that people’s extent
of reliance and interest on economic issues in times of crisis
such as COVID-19 was higher. However, the information and
news credibility of online content depended on how relevant
the audiences find them.
In sum, online and digital media are growing rapidly in
Pakistan. They have given everybody extra opportunities to
obtain information about all traits and aspects of life during
COVID-19. Akhtar and Pratt (2017) seem to agree with the
above observation as they opine that the present era is the age of
digital media where public and political divergence can be
achieved by online information dissemination. Given the
importance attributed to economic issues, it is no wonder then,
that the government, the public and the media have all exerted
a lot of energy in disseminating economic situation-related
contents during COVID-19 through online media platforms.
This, along with leadership statements about the economic
insecurities, has probably enhanced public concerns and
Information Discovery and Delivery
consequently raised their involvements. Therefore, in line with
this view and the prospect theory, we assumed that people
would show more concerns about economic issues, which, in
turn, influenced their perceptions (Chung and Koo, 2015).
Such concerns have been observed in the case of UGC
containing information related to the economic conditions
prevailing during COVID-19. These results are also in tandem
with past literature who argued that public perceptions are
widely influenced by news about uncertain economic situations
such as unemployment. In Pakistan people have more critical
economic conditions, hence, they gauge government
performance based on the actions of the government depicted
in contents regarding the economy. For example, in 2017 news
stating that “Pakistan’s expected annual growth rate in the next
10 years is approximately 6%” had attracted huge online traffic.
The government considered this news instrumental in
developing favorable perceptions among the masses.
5.1 Managerial implications
Based on the results, it was observed that Pakistanis showed, to
a great extent, trust in UGI. Such information was not
evaluated by them as a negative phenomenon or fake news. The
reliance on UGI among Pakistanis would have many
managerial implications for government and private
organizations in Pakistan. For, instance, public opinion may
rapidly change on a particular issue based on disseminated
UGC. This may complicate the image-building activities of the
said organizations. Managerially, social media sites of all
government organizations should be very active in providing
updates regarding their works/activities and their benefits on
the economy. This will certainly help the government to
recognize and appreciate its followers through their direct
feedback and their sentiments can be tracked up. Therefore, it
can be concluded that Pakistanis have started relying on online
media content, but this reliance is dependent on the issue’s
relevancy. In this scenario, the government should use online
media platforms to brief its citizens about their policies rather
than such information coming from UGC.
5.2 Limitations and future recommendations
The outcome of current research is established based on a small
and reasonably less representative sample. Therefore, a big
 Citizen journalism practices
Syed Hassan Raza et al.
sample, representative of a bigger portion of the general public,
may provide a dissimilar outcome. Past studies on digital
contents usually used the online survey method with small
sample size. Likewise, the current research used an online
survey method for data collection but there are some
limitations in using this method. Therefore, the quasi-
experimental study or field survey using a demonstrative
sample may be used in the future to validate the proposed
assumptions in this study. Albeit there are some
methodological (sample representativeness) restrictions in this
research, but the findings make a strong case for future studies
concerning systematically examining how the audiences
perceive citizen journalism practice in times of crisis.
Furthermore, future research may study public relations or
advertising units to understand how UGI available online is
challenging their practices.
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 Citizen journalism practices Information Discovery and Delivery
Syed Hassan Raza et al.

Appendix

Table A1 The details of measurement scales

Constructs Items
User-generated information: good Please evaluate to which degree you think the User-Generated Information narrating government of Pakistan
economic policies implemented good economic policies during COVID-19 are
(1) accurate
(2) trustworthy
(3) clear and well-written facts
User-generated information: ambiguous Please evaluate to which degree you think the User-Generated Information narrating government of Pakistan
economic policies implemented ambiguous economic policies during COVID-19 are
(1) accurate
(2) trustworthy
(3) clear and well-written facts
Trust (1) The information in an online UGI would be verifiable if examined
(2) All important information regarding economic policies during COVID-19 is provided in most of the UGI’s
(3) The essential facts are included in user UGI disseminated by citizen
(4) Usually, criticism in UGI on economic policies of government during COVID-19 is expressed adequately
Perception of government performance (1) Pakistan Government’s economic policies during COVID-19 benefit the citizens of Pakistan
during COVID-19 (2) Pakistan Government’s economic policies during COVID-19 reduces economic uncertainties
(3) Pakistan Government’s economic policies during COVID-19 make citizens’ businesses/employments secure
Notes: All items were measured in a “seven-point Likert scale (1 strongly disagree and 7 strongly agree).”

Full list of acronyms: published in many international peer-reviewed journals

SNS = Social networking sites.
UGC = User-generated content.
UGI = user-generated information.
TCJP = Trust in citizen journalism practices.
PGP = Perceiving government performance.
UGG = User-generated information: good economic
policies.
UGA = User-generated information: ambiguous
economic policies.
About the authors
Syed Hassan Raza is an Associate Professor at the
Department of Communication Studies, Bahauddin Zakariya
University, Multan, Pakistan. He holds a PhD in
communication from Universiti Utara Malaysia. His research
studies Advertising, Marketing communication, Health
Communication, new media and Journalism. He has
includes ISI and Scopus Index Journals. Orcid: orcid.org/
0000-0002-1318-7818 Syed Hassan Raza is the
corresponding author can be contacted at: sherazibzu@gmail.
com
Ogadimma C. Emenyeonu is a Lecturer at Faculty College
of Communication, University of Sharjah, UAE and holds a
PhD degree in Communication. His areas of research Interest
are Environmental Journalism, Health Journalism, New
media, Sociology of news production and Media Ethics.
Muhammad Yousaf Assistant Professor, Center for Media
and Communication Studies, University of Gujrat.
Moneeba Iftikhar is a Lecturer at the Department of Mass
Communication, Lahore College for Women University. She
also served in the field of advertising as a concept developer
and copywriter for more than 10 years and worked for many
multinational and national companies. Her area of specializing
is in media and communication Research.

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