4.3. Multivariate Statistics
Table 4 shows the results of our correlation model predicting Wuhan’s local government and citizen engagement during the COVID-19 crisis. Hypothesis 2 focused on whether the level of citizen engagement depends on the dialogic loop. The correlation model showed posts related to the COVID-19 crisis that contain “@other accounts” positively improve citizens’ reposts and likes, which indicated more interactions between different accounts. However, at the same time, none of the indicators of hashtag were significant. In summary, the dialogic loop factors are partially associated with citizen engagement.
Hypothesis 3 proposed that whether Weibo posts presented with media richness features of Wuhan Release tended to lead to more citizen engagement. Among them, the increase of pictures brought a significant increase in comments, because the pictures could deliver more information than text could convey, people were willing to express when they saw one or more pictures. However, the existence of video led to a decrease in comments. The difference between picture and video could explain this phenomenon, unlike the picture’s simply and visualized, learning the message of a video could waste more time, some people were unlikely to open the video or watch the full video, so they also showed no interest to discuss the video. The existence of links led to a significant increase in of likes, reposts, and comments, which means people tend to engage with information with reliable evidence. On the other hand, only important information needed to be explained further by linking. In consideration of the relationship between media videos and citizen engagement had a negative correlation. Thus, the media richness partially influent citizen engagement.
Hypothesis 4 mainly asked that whether the longer posts of Wuhan’s local government information release would result in a higher engagement rate. As the model result showed, text length was significantly positively associated with citizen engagement, especially with comments and likes, which means people tend to discuss the long text post.
Hypothesis 5 assumed that people tend to engage with original posts than non-original. The exam result is that posts containing sources negatively affected the three measures of citizen participation. It could be explained that people prefer to get involved in the original information.