{"id":464,"date":"2025-07-15T23:53:10","date_gmt":"2025-07-15T20:53:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/labs.journ.univ.kiev.ua\/hmel\/?page_id=464"},"modified":"2025-09-15T00:14:33","modified_gmt":"2025-09-14T21:14:33","slug":"about-the-project","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/labs.journ.univ.kiev.ua\/hmel\/about-the-project\/","title":{"rendered":"About the project"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Joint research project of the Department of Social Communications of the Educational and Scientific Institute of Journalism and the Department of Physiology and Anatomy of the National Scientific Center \u201cInstitute of Biology and Medicine\u201d \u201cTHE INFLUENCE OF NEWS LAYOUT ON THE PSYCHO-EMOTIONAL STATE OF CITIZENS OF VULNERABLE GROUPS\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

FROM THE PROJECT JUSTIFICATION:
Through the news, viewers\/listeners gain an idea of \u200b\u200bthe world with which they have no direct experience. News acts as a surrogate for personal contact, largely shaping perceptions of social problems (Zillman, Dolf, Gibson, Rhonda, Ordman, V. L., & Aust, C. F. (1994). Effects of Upbeat Stories in Broadcast News. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 38, 65-78. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1080\/08838159409364246). News TV and radio programs affect the psycho-emotional and mental state of citizens. A correctly constructed sequence of news stories in a program, their correct selection contributes to socio-psychological support, does not harm mental health. Research into the principle of “correctness” of layout is important both from the point of view of the reasonable application of this principle by media professionals and from the point of view of the social significance of the functioning of the media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In world media practice, there is an opinion that news releases, which are saturated with mostly emotionally negative stories, should end with a positive story, as this contributes to the restoration of the listener\/viewer’s psycho-emotional state towards a positive side (an example of such stories (see from 30.05 min). It is believed that ending a news release with a positive story performs several important functions: it forms an emotional conclusion and reduces the negative consequences of difficult stories; evokes positive emotions that expand attention, promote trust in the source and audience involvement; improves memory for the general release, replacing negative impressions with positive ones; provides aesthetic and psychological balance, supporting the emotional well-being of viewers. Positive stories in professional slang are called \u201cbows\u201d, \u201cdog with ears\u201d, \u201cfools\u201d, \u201ckicker\u201d, \u201chappy ending\u201d, etc. This media practice is reflected in the manuals on editorial standards (Schultz, 2005) as a principle of layout news releases. It has become part of constructive journalism. This practice has been scientifically formalized in modern studies, mostly by communication and psychology specialists (Lin, & et.al., 2022; Thaler, 2024). The study by D. Zillman (Zillman, & et.al., 1994), professor of communication and psychology at the University of Alabama-Tuscaloosa, can be considered a classic. Zillman managed to confirm the practice that positive stories that end a news release affect the perception of the importance of problems covered in previous disturbing stories, as well as the level of anxiety of viewers. However, a cheerful ending distorts the perception of serious social problems, reducing the impact of disturbing information. Does this meet the public interest? But, the researcher notes, we leave the moral assessment of this practice to media ethicists. In Ukraine, no studies have been conducted on the layout of news releases, in particular, taking into account the functions of stories-bows, despite the widespread editorial practice layout. In recent years, Dmytro Telenkov, a television presenter and currently a lecturer at the Taras Shevchenko Kyiv National University\u2019s Institute of Journalism, has been devoting his dissertation research to television layout. In his articles (2008; Telenkov, & et.al., 2022), he notes that in no case should a news release end with an announcement; it should be preceded by a light positive plot. The material on the Ukrinform website is devoted to the dominance of negative news in releases. The authors note: \u201cAll that would be enough is an adequate correction of editorial policy.\u201d As a conclusion, we can say that neither in foreign nor in domestic science there is a holistic theory of the layout of news releases, taking into account an adequate editorial policy regarding the distribution of negative and positive in the presentation of events. Is one final positive plot enough to dilute the negativity that falls on the heads of the audience? If individual empirical studies confirm the fact of the influence of positive stories on the perception and interpretation of the entire news release, then are the editorial offices not playing along with unscrupulous propaganda in popularizing the \u201cgood life\u201d and in frivolous perception of social problems? Where is the measure of the ratio of positive and negative with \u201cadequate editorial policy\u201d and what should that ratio be? To what extent do existing studies in the world adequately and accurately reproduce the dependence of the perception of a news release on the final positive stories? Whatever these studies are, they have a subjective basis for conclusions, because conclusions are made on the basis of surveys of the audience and editors, that is, they are based not on objective indicators, but on someone’s point of view. It is necessary to conduct a global review of both professional and scientific literature, to conduct a meta-analysis of the results of empirical studies of this fairly widespread and important for social practice principle of news layout regarding the ratio of negativity and positivity in a news release. It is also necessary to conduct systematic experimental studies of the audience’s reaction to news releases using methods that record objective indicators of psychophysiological activity, because only in this way can one understand the “work” of a particular news story at the subconscious level of influence. For this reason, researchers from the Department of Physiology and Anatomy of the Educational and Scientific Center “Institute of Biology and Medicine” of Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, who possess methods for detecting neurophysiological markers of stress and emotional states using the analysis of electrical activity of the brain (electroencephalography \u2014 EEG), heart rate variability (HRV), and electrodermal activity (EDA), have been involved in our project. It should be noted that the National Institute of Journalism also has a special Laboratory of Hidden Media Effects, which uses the aforementioned methods. There are attempts at neurophysiological research of news content (Lin, & et.al., 2022). The use of psychophysiological methods \u2014 such as EEG, HRV, and EDA \u2014 opens up new opportunities for objectively measuring the impact of news content on the psychoemotional state of viewers\/listeners, in particular people with increased vulnerability. Traditional questionnaires and self-assessments do not always capture fleeting or unconscious reactions that may be critical for understanding the stressoriness or calming effect of a particular information presentation structure. Instead, neurophysiological indicators allow real-time tracking of arousal, tension, cognitive load, and emotional engagement, which allows identifying the most adaptive or, conversely, potentially harmful layout options (Sistiaga, S. et al., 2024; Clayton, R. B., & Myrick, J. G., 2025). This approach is innovative in the context of research on information impact, especially given the social demand for reducing anxiety and supporting the mental health of citizens in conditions of protracted crises. Our project is an attempt at a systematic experimental study of the construction of a news release taking into account objective indicators that characterize the appropriate distribution (measure) of positive and negative stories in the release in terms of their impact on the perception of the importance of problems covered in previous anxiety stories, as well as on the level of anxiety. The authors of the project deliberately chose vulnerable citizens for experiments among various social groups, because if even in such groups a change in psycho-emotional states under the influence of the specified principle of news layout is confirmed, this will become an obvious argument in favor of the fact that the principle “works” and can be applied to other audiences who are in a relatively normal state, although this will require additional examinations of the functionality of the principle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Clayton, R. B., & Myrick, J. G. (2025). \u201cWhat Can the Heart Tell Us About Thinking?\u201d A Three-Decade Review of Heart Rate Measurement and Its Future Applications to Advertising Research. Journal of Advertising<\/em>, 1\u201316. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1080\/00913367.2025.2515905<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dmytro Telenkov, Tetiana Krainikova and Tetiana Yezhyzhanska (2022). Models of TV news layout: Different types of marketing narrative. Innovative Marketing, 18(1), 117-130. DOI: http:\/\/dx.doi.org\/10.21511\/im.18(1).2022.10<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Martin D. Vestergaard and Wolfram Schultz. (2020).Retrospective Valuation of Experienced Outcome Encoded in Distinct Reward Representations in the Anterior Insula and Amygdala. Journal of Neuroscience 11 November, 40 (46) 8938-8950; https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1523\/JNEUROSCI.2130-19.2020<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Schultz, B. (2005).  Broadcast news producing. SAGE Publications, Inc., https:\/\/doi.org\/10.4135\/9781452233093<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sistiaga S, Bodart A, Sequeira H, Campanella S. (2024). Emotion Regulation Assessment: A New Perspective Using Simultaneous Electroencephalographic and Electrodermal Recordings. Clinical EEG and Neuroscience<\/em>, 56(4), 295-304. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1177\/15500594241302553<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thaler, M. (2024). Good News Is Not a Sufficient Condition for Motivated Reasoning. https:\/\/arxiv.org\/abs\/2012.01548<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Zilin Lin, Kasper Welbers, Susan Vermeer, Damian Trilling. (2022). Beyond Discrete Genres: Mapping News Items <\/strong>onto aMultidimensional Framework of Genre Cues. <\/strong>https:\/\/arxiv.org\/abs\/2212.04185<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Zillman, Dolf, Gibson, Rhonda, Ordman, V. L., & Aust, C. F. (1994). Effects of Upbeat Stories in Broadcast News. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 38, 65-78. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1080\/08838159409364246<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u0422\u0435\u043b\u0435\u043d\u043a\u043e\u0432 \u0414. \u0412. (2008). \u041e\u0441\u043e\u0431\u043b\u0438\u0432\u043e\u0441\u0442\u0456 \u0442\u0435\u043b\u0435\u0432\u0456\u0437\u0456\u0439\u043d\u043e\u0457 \u0432\u0435\u0440\u0441\u0442\u043a\u0438 \u043d\u043e\u0432\u0438\u043d. \u041a\u0438\u0457\u0432\u0441\u044c\u043a\u0438\u0439 \u043d\u0430\u0446\u0456\u043e\u043d\u0430\u043b\u044c\u043d\u0438\u0439 \u0443\u043d\u0456\u0432\u0435\u0440\u0441\u0438\u0442\u0435\u0442 \u0456\u043c\u0435\u043d\u0456 \u0422\u0430\u0440\u0430\u0441\u0430 \u0428\u0435\u0432\u0447\u0435\u043d\u043a\u0430. \u041d\u0430\u0443\u043a\u043e\u0432\u0456 \u0437\u0430\u043f\u0438\u0441\u043a\u0438 \u0406\u043d\u0441\u0442\u0438\u0442\u0443\u0442\u0443 \u0436\u0443\u0440\u043d\u0430\u043b\u0456\u0441\u0442\u0438\u043a\u0438, 32, 53\u201358. https:\/\/tinyurl.com\/sciennotes<\/a>  <\/p>\n\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Joint research project of the Department of Social Communications of the Educational and Scientific Institute of Journalism and the Department of Physiology and Anatomy of the National Scientific Center \u201cInstitute of Biology and Medicine\u201d \u201cTHE INFLUENCE OF NEWS LAYOUT ON THE PSYCHO-EMOTIONAL STATE OF CITIZENS OF VULNERABLE GROUPS\u201d FROM THE PROJECT JUSTIFICATION:Through the news, viewers\/listeners gain an idea of \u200b\u200bthe world with which they have no direct experience. News acts as a surrogate for personal contact, largely shaping perceptions of social problems (Zillman, Dolf, Gibson, Rhonda, Ordman, V. L., & Aust, C. F. (1994). Effects of Upbeat Stories in Broadcast News. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 38, 65-78. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1080\/08838159409364246). News TV and radio programs affect the psycho-emotional and mental state of citizens. A correctly constructed sequence of news stories in a program, their correct selection contributes to socio-psychological support, does not harm mental health. Research into the principle of “correctness” of layout is important both from the point of view of the reasonable application of this principle by media professionals and from the point of view of the social significance of the functioning of the media. In world media practice, there is an opinion that news releases, which are saturated with mostly emotionally negative stories, should end with a positive story, as this contributes to the restoration of the listener\/viewer’s psycho-emotional state towards a positive side (an example of such stories (see from 30.05 min). It is believed that ending a news release with a positive story performs several important functions: it forms an emotional conclusion and reduces the negative consequences of difficult stories; evokes positive emotions that expand attention, promote trust in the source and audience involvement; improves memory for the general release, replacing negative impressions with positive ones; provides aesthetic and psychological balance, supporting the emotional well-being of viewers. Positive stories in professional slang are called \u201cbows\u201d, \u201cdog with ears\u201d, \u201cfools\u201d, \u201ckicker\u201d, \u201chappy ending\u201d, etc. This media practice is reflected in the manuals on editorial standards (Schultz, 2005) as a principle of layout news releases. It has become part of constructive journalism. This practice has been scientifically formalized in modern studies, mostly by communication and psychology specialists (Lin, & et.al., 2022; Thaler, 2024). The study by D. Zillman (Zillman, & et.al., 1994), professor of communication and psychology at the University of Alabama-Tuscaloosa, can be considered a classic. Zillman managed to confirm the practice that positive stories that end a news release affect the perception of the importance of problems covered in previous disturbing stories, as well as the level of anxiety of viewers. However, a cheerful ending distorts the perception of serious social problems, reducing the impact of disturbing information. Does this meet the public interest? But, the researcher notes, we leave the moral assessment of this practice to media ethicists. In Ukraine, no studies have been conducted on the layout of news releases, in particular, taking into account the functions of stories-bows, despite the widespread editorial practice layout. In recent years, Dmytro Telenkov, a television presenter and currently a lecturer at the Taras Shevchenko Kyiv National University\u2019s Institute of Journalism, has been devoting his dissertation research to television layout. In his articles (2008; Telenkov, & et.al., 2022), he notes that in no case should a news release end with an announcement; it should be preceded by a light positive plot. The material on the Ukrinform website is devoted to the dominance of negative news in releases. The authors note: \u201cAll that would be enough is an adequate correction of editorial policy.\u201d As a conclusion, we can say that neither in foreign nor in domestic science there is a holistic theory of the layout of news releases, taking into account an adequate editorial policy regarding the distribution of negative and positive in the presentation of events. Is one final positive plot enough to dilute the negativity that falls on the heads of the audience? If individual empirical studies confirm the fact of the influence of positive stories on the perception and interpretation of the entire news release, then are the editorial offices not playing along with unscrupulous propaganda in popularizing the \u201cgood life\u201d and in frivolous perception of social problems? Where is the measure of the ratio of positive and negative with \u201cadequate editorial policy\u201d and what should that ratio be? To what extent do existing studies in the world adequately and accurately reproduce the dependence of the perception of a news release on the final positive stories? Whatever these studies are, they have a subjective basis for conclusions, because conclusions are made on the basis of surveys of the audience and editors, that is, they are based not on objective indicators, but on someone’s point of view. It is necessary to conduct a global review of both professional and scientific literature, to conduct a meta-analysis of the results of empirical studies of this fairly widespread and important for social practice principle of news layout regarding the ratio of negativity and positivity in a news release. It is also necessary to conduct systematic experimental studies of the audience’s reaction to news releases using methods that record objective indicators of psychophysiological activity, because only in this way can one understand the “work” of a particular news story at the subconscious level of influence. For this reason, researchers from the Department of Physiology and Anatomy of the Educational and Scientific Center “Institute of Biology and Medicine” of Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, who possess methods for detecting neurophysiological markers of stress and emotional states using the analysis of electrical activity of the brain (electroencephalography \u2014 EEG), heart rate variability (HRV), and electrodermal activity (EDA), have been involved in our project. It should be noted that the National Institute of Journalism also has a special Laboratory of Hidden Media Effects, which uses the aforementioned methods. There are attempts at neurophysiological research of news content (Lin, & et.al., 2022). The use of psychophysiological methods \u2014 such as EEG, HRV, and EDA \u2014 opens up new opportunities for objectively measuring the impact of news content on the psychoemotional state of viewers\/listeners, in particular people with increased vulnerability. Traditional questionnaires and self-assessments do not always capture fleeting or unconscious reactions that may be critical for understanding the stressoriness or calming effect of a particular information presentation structure. Instead, neurophysiological indicators allow real-time tracking of arousal, tension, cognitive load, and emotional engagement, which allows identifying the most adaptive or, conversely, potentially harmful layout options (Sistiaga, S. et al., 2024; Clayton, R. B., & Myrick, J. G., 2025). This approach is innovative in the context of research on information impact, especially given the social demand for reducing anxiety and supporting the mental health of citizens in conditions of protracted crises. Our project is an attempt at a systematic experimental study of the construction of a news release taking into account objective indicators that characterize the appropriate distribution (measure) of positive and negative stories in the release in terms of their impact on the perception of the importance of problems covered in previous anxiety stories, as well as on the level of anxiety. The authors of the project deliberately chose vulnerable citizens for experiments among various social groups, because if even in such groups a change in psycho-emotional states under the influence of the specified principle of news layout is confirmed, this will become an obvious argument in favor of the fact that the principle “works” and can be applied to other audiences who are in a relatively normal state, although this will require additional examinations of the functionality of the principle. Clayton, R. B., & Myrick, J. G. (2025). \u201cWhat Can the Heart Tell Us About Thinking?\u201d A Three-Decade Review of Heart Rate Measurement and Its Future Applications to Advertising Research. Journal of Advertising, 1\u201316. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1080\/00913367.2025.2515905 Dmytro Telenkov, Tetiana Krainikova and Tetiana Yezhyzhanska (2022). Models of TV news layout: Different types of marketing narrative. Innovative Marketing, 18(1), 117-130. DOI: http:\/\/dx.doi.org\/10.21511\/im.18(1).2022.10 Martin D. Vestergaard and Wolfram Schultz. (2020).Retrospective Valuation of Experienced Outcome Encoded in Distinct Reward Representations in the Anterior Insula and Amygdala. Journal of Neuroscience 11 November, 40 (46) 8938-8950; https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1523\/JNEUROSCI.2130-19.2020 Schultz, B. (2005).  Broadcast news producing. SAGE Publications, Inc., https:\/\/doi.org\/10.4135\/9781452233093 Sistiaga S, Bodart A, Sequeira H, Campanella S. (2024). Emotion Regulation Assessment: A New Perspective Using Simultaneous Electroencephalographic and Electrodermal Recordings. Clinical EEG and Neuroscience, 56(4), 295-304. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1177\/15500594241302553 Thaler, M. (2024). Good News Is Not a Sufficient Condition for Motivated Reasoning. https:\/\/arxiv.org\/abs\/2012.01548 Zilin Lin, Kasper Welbers, Susan Vermeer, Damian Trilling. (2022). Beyond Discrete Genres: Mapping News Items onto aMultidimensional Framework of Genre Cues. https:\/\/arxiv.org\/abs\/2212.04185 Zillman, Dolf, Gibson, Rhonda, Ordman, V. L., & Aust, C. F. (1994). Effects of Upbeat Stories in Broadcast News. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 38, 65-78. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1080\/08838159409364246 \u0422\u0435\u043b\u0435\u043d\u043a\u043e\u0432 \u0414. \u0412. (2008). \u041e\u0441\u043e\u0431\u043b\u0438\u0432\u043e\u0441\u0442\u0456 \u0442\u0435\u043b\u0435\u0432\u0456\u0437\u0456\u0439\u043d\u043e\u0457 \u0432\u0435\u0440\u0441\u0442\u043a\u0438 \u043d\u043e\u0432\u0438\u043d. \u041a\u0438\u0457\u0432\u0441\u044c\u043a\u0438\u0439 \u043d\u0430\u0446\u0456\u043e\u043d\u0430\u043b\u044c\u043d\u0438\u0439 \u0443\u043d\u0456\u0432\u0435\u0440\u0441\u0438\u0442\u0435\u0442 \u0456\u043c\u0435\u043d\u0456 \u0422\u0430\u0440\u0430\u0441\u0430 \u0428\u0435\u0432\u0447\u0435\u043d\u043a\u0430. \u041d\u0430\u0443\u043a\u043e\u0432\u0456 \u0437\u0430\u043f\u0438\u0441\u043a\u0438 \u0406\u043d\u0441\u0442\u0438\u0442\u0443\u0442\u0443 \u0436\u0443\u0440\u043d\u0430\u043b\u0456\u0441\u0442\u0438\u043a\u0438, 32, 53\u201358. https:\/\/tinyurl.com\/sciennotes  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-464","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/labs.journ.univ.kiev.ua\/hmel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/464","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/labs.journ.univ.kiev.ua\/hmel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/labs.journ.univ.kiev.ua\/hmel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/labs.journ.univ.kiev.ua\/hmel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/labs.journ.univ.kiev.ua\/hmel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=464"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/labs.journ.univ.kiev.ua\/hmel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/464\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":479,"href":"http:\/\/labs.journ.univ.kiev.ua\/hmel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/464\/revisions\/479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/labs.journ.univ.kiev.ua\/hmel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}