Information and Environmental Media Hygiene as an Object of Sociological Analysis

Abstract

   Relevance. The widespread use of modern information and communication technologies, in particular, social Internet media, forms a special space (media ecosystem), which has a significant impact on the formation of public opinion, values and behavior of people. Particularly significant in the realities of expanding the boundaries of the media space of the culture of modern society, in the context of human interaction and the media ecosystem, is the researchers' appeal to the problem of determining the basic principles of the information and environmental media hygiene, considered as the ability of society to resist the destructive influence of media discourse in the post-truth era and related to the study of the influence of the media on mental and moral health of a person.   The purpose of this work is a sociological analysis of the information and environmental media environment as one of the directions of countering the risks and dangers of the modern media environment.   Objectives: disclosure of the essence of the main risks and dangers of the modern media environment; analysis of the relationship between the concepts of "information hygiene" and "information and environmental media hygiene"; definition of the basic principles of information and environmental media hygiene both from the side of modern social media (primarily Internet communication) and from the side of modern active users of the media environment (both media consumers and media producers).   Methodology. The article uses such general scientific methods as comparative analysis, synthesis, abstraction and generalization. The research is based on the basic principles of a systematic and structural-functional approach. An ecological approach to understanding the media space was chosen as the main theoretical and methodological guideline.   Results. The paper presents the results of theoretical and methodological analysis of the phenomenon of information and environmental media hygiene. The basic principles of the information and environmental media hygiene are defined and formulated both on the part of modern social media (primarily Internet communication media) and on the part of modern active users of the media environment (both media consumers and media producers).   Conclusions. The modern media space and the developed media environment, in addition to providing various benefits and privileges to meet the information needs of media users, also carries large-scale risks and dangers, which, first of all, include infodemia and infoxification. Due to the fact that these negative phenomena have serious consequences for society, it becomes especially important to define and develop the principles of information and environmental media hygiene, which must be observed both by modern social media (primarily Internet communication) and by active users of the media environment (both media consumers and media producers).