Governance effects of media coverage on firms' R&D activities under signalling theory: The moderating effect of economic policy uncertainty and the mediating role of financing constraints

The influence of media coverage on organizations' research and development operations is a significant subject within the intersection of corporate governance and innovation management studies. This study examines Chinese A‐share listed businesses from 2012 to 2021, utilizing signaling theory to investigate the influence of media reporting on corporate R&D investment. The data are sourced from the China Research Data Service Platform (CNRDS) and the China Economic and Financial Research Database （CSMAR）. A total of 3,303 listed companies are selected to form the unbalanced panel data. A two-way fixed-effects model is employed to account for individual and temporal heterogeneity, as well as to address endogeneity through the instrumental variable method. The study concludes that media coverage substantially enhances firms' R&D investment by mitigating financing constraints, with the effect persisting across different media channels (online/traditional) and reporting tendencies (positive/negative); economic policy uncertainty amplifies the marginal impact of media coverage on R&D investment; and the heterogeneity analysis indicates that the R&D investment of non-state-owned firms, industries with low pollution levels, and firms located in the eastern region is more responsive to media signals. Mechanism experiments indicate that both positive and negative reports can diminish the cost of debt funding, both network and negative reports exert a substantial inhibitory influence on the cost of equity financing; nonetheless, all report types result in a decline in financing efficiency. The research indicates that organizations must develop a dynamic media management system to dismantle information silos, investors should create a “public opinion-financing structure” analytical framework to discern valuation risks, and regulators ought to refine the media credit rating system to mitigate false disclosures, thereby improving the efficiency of innovation resource allocation through collaborative efforts and fostering new momentum for the high-quality advancement of the economy.

媒体报道对企业研发（Research and Development）活动的影响，是公司治理与创新管理研究交叉领域的核心议题。本研究以2012-2021年中国A股上市公司为研究样本，基于信号理论（Signaling Theory）探究媒体报道对企业研发投资的影响。数据取自中国研究数据服务平台（China Research Data Service Platform，CNRDS）与中国经济金融研究数据库（China Economic and Financial Research Database，CSMAR），最终选取3303家上市公司构建非平衡面板数据集。本研究采用双向固定效应模型以控制个体与时间异质性，并通过工具变量法解决内生性问题。研究结果表明：媒体报道可通过缓解融资约束显著提升企业研发投资，且该效应在不同媒体渠道（线上/传统）和报道倾向（正向/负向）下均显著存在；经济政策不确定性会强化媒体报道对企业研发投资的边际影响；异质性分析显示，非国有企业、低污染行业企业以及东部地区企业的研发投资对媒体信号的响应更为显著。机制检验显示：正向与负向报道均能降低债务融资成本；网络媒体报道与负向报道均对股权融资成本产生显著抑制作用；但各类报道均会导致融资效率下降。本研究据此提出实践启示：企业应构建动态媒体管理体系以打破信息壁垒；投资者应建立"舆论-融资结构"分析框架以甄别估值风险；监管机构应完善媒体信用评级制度以遏制虚假披露，进而通过多方协同提升创新资源配置效率，为经济高质量发展培育新动能。