Expert Forecasts vs Viral Headlines: Who Shapes Our Sense of Danger

In our hyperconnected era, fear travels faster than facts. This book examines the widening gap between how experts assess risk and how the public perceives it through viral media. From health scares to geopolitical crises, headlines often define what feels dangerous long before data does. "Expert Forecasts vs Viral Headlines" investigates how competing narratives—scientific, journalistic, and emotional—shape our collective sense of safety and threat. Drawing on examples from the 2020s, it reveals the tension between institutional credibility and digital virality, showing how authority itself is contested in the attention economy. Rather than portraying one side as right or wrong, the book explores how emotion and trust mediate modern communication, turning complex forecasts into public moral dramas. It is a study of how danger becomes both information and identity in our time.