Economic Image of Countries

The beginning of the pandemic saw a significant social and economic transformation: active Internet users appeared to be the most advantageous and adaptive stratum, which included people (mainly youth) whose professional activities and personal relationships depended on the Internet. These people proved to be a promising pool for research on the economic component of the complex image of a country at the cognitive, irrational, domestic, and international levels, with its economic, political, cultural, and other components. This article reports the results of a study of the dynamics of the economic component, obtained by the author through empirical research conducted by the author over the course of 23 years. In the mass consciousness of young people who had never visited a particular country, its economic component was represented by vestigial emotional impressions of national brands, goods, traditional products, and stereotypes voiced by media people, bloggers, and opinion leaders. The positive image of a country as a basis for economic development proved to correlate with the tourist attractiveness. After the COVID-19 pandemic, historical and cultural information gave way to other factors of shaping the national economic image, i.e., availability and source of information about the country, opinions promoted by Internet bloggers, influencers, TV series, dramas, films, and media, tourist video content, etc. The author believes that the image of Russia and other countries should be monitored and intentionally shaped in the mass consciousness, both at the cognitive and emotional levels.