Analysis on Life Cycle of Network Public Opinion

As the rapid development of network throughout the world, network media has been recognized by the public as the “4th media” following newspaper, radio broadcast and television. Network has become one of the major carriers reflecting the social public opinion. In the communication framework, the network public opinion space is called by many domestic scholars as the network public opinion environment. This shows that both generation and development of network public opinion will invariably appear, develop and realize in a certain time and space environment, i.e a life cycle for network public opinion from starting to declining. KEYWORD: network public opinion; Life cycle; H7N9 bird flue; Haze International Conference on Social Science, Education Management and Sports Education (SSEMSE 2015) © 2015. The authors Published by Atlantis Press 728 Through study and analysis, Zhang Heng concludes the two meanings of the life cycle of network public opinion. (A) The life cycle of a network public opinion generated around a network event is just like a life, it will also experience a “life cycle” from starting to declining; (B) We can divide the network public opinion reflected through a network event into 4 stages, including the incubation stage, growth stage, mature stage and declining stage. Each stage has the following characteristics: (1) Incubation stage In this stage, most public opinion events appearing in the network are social issues concerned by network users, who express their positive or negative opinions online. These public opinion events slowly brew in this stage and stand out once sufficient strength is accumulated. (2) Growth stage When breaks out in the incubation stage, the network public opinion event will cause an uproar in the network, it attracts concerns from not only the network users, but also social media, a widespread concern will be attached in the community. (3) Mature stage Most network users form the common opinion, such a mainstream opinion symbolizes that the event reaches the culminate in this stage. (4) Declining stage The network public opinion event is settled, yet this does not mean the end of the event, it is only because that the concern of network users and media is attracted by new network events, the network users begin to focus on new objects, new events and new topics. Through the study results mentioned above, the paper compares and summaries the characteristics of network public opinion in different stages. Table 1. Table about comparison between characteristics of network public opinion in different sages Stage Cause significance Network popularity Concentration of network opinions Network energy Emergency Progress Incubation stage Fuzzy Very low Dispersed Very weak Begin to appear Growth stage Increasingly prominent Increased stably Gathering from different channels Gathering slowly Develops slowly Mature stage Completely prominent Increased rapidly Rapid concentration Gathering rapidly Develops rapidly Declining stage Gradually eliminated Declining gradually Gradually dispersed Declining gradually Solved gradually 3 ANALYSIS ON LIFE CYCLE OF NETWORK PUBLIC OPINION EVENTS Based on the top 10 news events and network public opinion hot events in 2013, some events are selected to perform analysis on life cycle. From the event selected, we can observe that network public opinion events are broadly divided into two types, including unexpected events, such as Ya’an earthquake, Hengda wins the champion, etc and continuing events, such as fog and haze weather, Chang E III, etc. Table 2. List of network public opinion events H7N9 bird flu Fog and haze Ya’an earthquake Hengda wins the champion Salt seizing event Rubber duck to China Dead pigs in Jiaxing Mayun resigns from CEO Rare hot weather Change E III Final appeal against Li** Chen Yongzhou case Cancer village Moyan wining the Nobel prize Establishment of Shanghai FTA Shenzhou 10 Opening of Beijing Garden Exop Third plenary session of 18 Taobao double eleven Guo Meimei event Two network public opinion events with different nature are selected from the above list for analysis. 3.1 Analysis on life cycle of H7N9 bird flu event In the first half of 2013, “H7N9” became a popular word in the network. H7N9 subtype avian influenza virus is a type of influenza. In the end of March 2013, 3 patients infected by H7N9 bird flue were first found in Shanghai and Anhui. In April 2013, H7N9 bird flu began to outbreak throughout the state. As a hot event in the network public opinion, the life cycle of the spread of H7N9 bird flue can be divided into 4 stages, as shown below: Figure 1. Schematic diagram about network communication life cycle of H7N9 bird flue