INFORMATION AND PSYCHOLOGICAL IMPACT ON PUBLIC OPINION

Abstract

The purpose of the research is a theoretical analysis of the information and communication impact on public opinion. To achieve this goal, the following research tasks were set: – to analyze the degree of development of the problem; examine the conceptual and categorical apparatus of research; consider the main theoretical and methodological approaches to the study of informational and psychological influence on public opinion; to analyze the features of resistance to destructive influence and manipulation. The research is based on an interdisciplinary approach, since the problem of informational and psychological influence on public opinion lies in the field of interdisciplinary interaction: law, psychology, sociology, law and information technologies. The theoretical and methodological basis became the works of outstanding thinkers of different periods, in particular, P. Lazarsfeld, H. Lasswell, M. McLuhan, V. Lipman, S. Moskovycha, B. Berelson, N. Luhmann, E. Noel- Neumann, and others, who came to the conclusion about the powerful influence of the informational and psychological environment on individual and mass consciousness. As a result of the research, definitions of public opinion and informational and psychological influence on public opinion are formulated. In our opinion, public opinion is a product of public consciousness, which is a set of opinions of members of large social groups about the manifestations of social life (facts, phenomena, processes, etc.), and has an impact on social and political processes in society and the state. Information-psychological impact on public opinion is the direction of information-psychological methods on public consciousness, as a result of which thoughts, views, preferences, value orientations, as well as behavior of the object of influence change in accordance with the goals of the subject of influence.