Anti-Asian Sentiments During the COVID-19 Pandemic Across 20 Countries: Analysis of a 12-Billion-Word News Media Database

Abstract

Background US president Joe Biden signed an executive action directing federal agencies to combat hate crimes and racism against Asians, which have percolated during the COVID-19 pandemic. This is one of the first known empirical studies to dynamically test whether global societal sentiments toward Asians have become more negative during the COVID-19 pandemic. Objective This study aimed to investigate whether global societal sentiments toward Asians across 20 countries have become more negative, month by month, from before the pandemic (October 2019) to May 2020, along with the pandemic (incidence and mortality rates) and cultural (Hofstede’s cultural dimensions) predictors of this trend. Methods We leveraged a 12-billion-word web-based media database, with over 30 million newspaper and magazine articles taken from over 7000 sites across 20 countries, and identified 6 synonyms of “Asian” that are related to the coronavirus. We compiled their most frequently used descriptors (collocates) from October 2019 to May 2020 across 20 countries, culminating in 85,827 collocates that were rated by 2 independent researchers to provide a Cumulative Asian Sentiment Score (CASS) per month. This allowed us to track significant shifts in societal sentiments toward Asians from a baseline period (October to December 2019) to the onset of the pandemic (January to May 2020). We tested the competing predictors of this trend: pandemic variables of incidence and mortality rates measured monthly for all 20 countries taken from the Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker, and Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions of Individualism, Power Distance, Uncertainty Avoidance, and Masculinity for the 20 countries. Results Before the pandemic in December 2019, Jamaica and New Zealand evidenced the most negative societal sentiments toward Asians; when news about the coronavirus was released in January 2020, the United States and Nigeria evidenced the most negative sentiments toward Asians among 20 countries. Globally, sentiments of Asians became more negative—a significant linear decline during the COVID-19 pandemic. CASS trended neutral before the pandemic during the baseline period of October to November 2019 and then plummeted in February 2020. CASS were, ironically, not predicted by COVID-19’s incidence and mortality rates, but rather by Hofstede’s cultural dimensions: individualism, power distance, and uncertainty avoidance—as shown by mixed models (N=28,494). Specifically, higher power distance, individualism, and uncertainty avoidance were associated with negative societal sentiments toward Asians. Conclusions Racism, in the form of Anti-Asian sentiments, are deep-seated, and predicated on structural undercurrents of culture. The COVID-19 pandemic may have indirectly and inadvertently exacerbated societal tendencies for racism. Our study lays the important groundwork to design interventions and policy communications to ameliorate Anti-Asian racism, which are culturally nuanced and contextually appropriate.

Hostility Toward Baby Boomers on TikTok

“…To minimize potential bias, the videos were rated by two researchers and evidenced high interrater reliability. Nevertheless, in view of the rising popularity of TikTok and its power to shape public perceptions, we encourage more TikTok-related research on the topic that could include psychometrics ( Ng, Allore et al, 2020 ; Ng & Levy, 2018 ; Ng & Rayner, 2010 ), big data techniques ( Giest & Ng, 2018 ; Ng, 2018 ; Ng, Lim et al, 2020 ; Ng & Tan, 2021a ) used to analyze news media ( Ng, 2021a , 2021b ) across cultures ( Ng et al, 2021a , 2021b ; Ng & Indran, 2021a , 2021b ; Ng & Tan, 2021b ) and time ( Ng & Chow, 2021 ).…”

The Impact of Aging Policy on Societal Age Stereotypes and Ageism

“…While the latter might be inevitable, though unintended, existing policy communications could include an additional component to highlight positive stories of resilience and wellness to counteract the negativity. In addition, most aging policies frame older adults based on their age, labeling them as “senior citizens” or “old people”—such age-based framing is linked to increased ageism ( Ng & Indran, 2021b , 2021c ; Ng et al, 2021a ; Ng et al, 2021b ; Ng et al, 2015 ). Though policies are typically age-based, policymakers could promote role-based framing, emphasizing older adults’ familial (e.g., grandparenting) and professional roles to ameliorate ageism ( Ng & Indran, 2021b ).…”

“…Hypothesis 2, a mediation hypothesis, states that the association between the Aging Policy Agenda Setting and SAS will be mediated by Medicalization of Aging (defined as the association of physical health and medical terminology with older adults; Heidekrueger et al, 2017 ; Ng, 2021b ; Ng & Chow, 2020 ; Ng et al, 2012 , 2021 ). With the PGP as a policy primarily focused on health care and medical subsidies, the link between older adults and physical ailments may be unwittingly strengthened, promoting the Medicalization of Aging, and consequently, increasing negative age stereotypes.…”

Detection of Racist Language in French Tweets

“…Failure to moderate such content can cost the company in multiple ways: loss of users, a drop in stock value, sanctions from legal authorities, etc. A news article [3] and several academic studies [4,5] indicate that during the recent COVID-19 crisis, there was a drastic increase in hate speech against people from China and other Asian countries on Twitter.…”