News consumption and media coverage during the confinement by COVID-19: Information overload, ideological bias and sensationalism

Abstract

The Covid-19 pandemic has confined millions of citizens in their homes. The situation of isolation has many consequences at multiple levels: social, psychological, economic, educational…, and also communicative. Based on a survey to 1,122 people during the most severe confinement phase, this article aims to analyze how information consumption has been modified during this period of time, and how citizens assess media coverage of Covid-19. The results show citizenship get more news and more frequently than before the health crisis. All in all, citizens maintain a critical attitude towards media coverage of the outbreak, which is, according to the results, conditioned by the media ideology, and reported in a sensationalist way, generating unnecessary social alarm.