Investigating the Consequences of Public Opinion Inversion from the Perspective of Social Security and Strategies Coping with it

The present study was conducted with the aim of investigating the consequences of public opinion inversion from the perspective of social security and strategies coping with it.

The research was of qualitative type with the underlying theory approach (grounded theory). Due to the interdisciplinary nature of issues related to the public opinion inversion, in-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted with 43 experts and pundits engaged in communication, media, sociology and psychology issues. In order to analyze the data, three-stage open coding, axial coding and selective Strauss-Corbin coding were used. The study reached saturation with 35 interviews, and eight other interviews were conducted in terms of achieving reliability and information saturation. The sampling method was purposefully dependent on the criterion. Based on this, experts who had experience or examples of issues related to public opinion and its inversion were selected and then the interview went on. In order to ensure the validity of the research, following the implementation and extraction of concepts, each interview was presented to the interviewee and then the categories and themes were submitted to 10 communication and sociology experts.

The research findings indicated that cases such as; Loss of public trust and reduction of social capital, reduction of social mobilization capacity, perceptual consequences of audience resistance toward the message, weakening of national solidarity, foreigners' message becoming authority , influencing governance method and weakening public policies, outbreak of crisis of acceptability and legitimacy in the structure pave the ground for the emergence of security challenges, continuation of public dissatisfaction and loss of social trust are among the most important consequences of the phenomenon of inversion of public opinion, which generally have security effects and dimensions. The research results showed that although most of the consequences of the inversion of public opinion are related to security and social areas (social security); dealing with these consequences, is the most important strategy to make reforms in communication and management. The necessity of being honest with the public, improving efficiency and effectiveness, eliminating the grounds for social divisions, reforming communication mechanisms, paying attention to the basic and priority demands of the public, making wise decisions and the necessity of decisions being convincing, paying attention to the critics voices are the most important things that need to top the list of measures and reforms in the governance system.