Agenda-setting relations between Chinese state media reports and public social media posts: focusing on COVID-19

This study explores differences and cross-arena relations in agenda construction between the People’s Daily , the official publication of the Chinese Communist Party, and Weibo, a widely used social media platform, by analyzing the structural similarities of attribute networks within media reports and Weibo posts about COVID-19 in China. Drawing on network agenda-setting theory, the study assesses how agenda attributes co-occur and exhibit similar structural patterns across arenas and stages of the COVID-19 issue life cycle. By revealing a statistically significant positive relation between the two arenas’ attribute networks, as well as variance in strength and configuration similarities across stages, this study deepens our understanding of the roles and interactions between traditional and platform media in China and provides key insights into factors driving public opinion formation in China.