The article examines the problem of graduality of word-formation means of expressing evaluation (on the material of media neologisms), in particular, the negative evaluative semantics that prevails in modern media discourse. The hypothesis of the research is that neologisms express an evaluation in an explicit and implicit form; moreover, the parameter of explicitness/implicitness is gradual and can be expressed to a greater or lesser extent depending on the structural and semantic features of a neologism and the contextual conditions of its use. The research aims to identify the factors that form the explicit or implicit evaluative semantics of neologisms, whilst intensifying the manifestation of this parameter; to construct the model of the neologism evaluative scale based on the explicit/implicit parameter; and to identify the transition zones of the scale. The research is carried out on the basis of a corpus of contexts with negative evaluative neologisms (770 contexts), formed on the basis of a content analysis of Russian Internet media of various sociopolitical orientation (17 editions in total). In the course of the research, the methods of structural-semantic, word-formation analysis, stylistic analysis of neologisms were used in combination with methods of discourse analysis and content analysis of the text corpus. As a result of the study, four groups of neologisms (divided into subgroups) were identified, located on the evaluative scale in the order of de-intensification of the negative evaluative semantics. The factors of neutralization of the evaluative semantics were considered, as well as the conditions for the formation of the evaluative semantics for neutral elements in the language system. The following factors influencing the degree of explicitness/implicitness of the estimated value are considered: semantics and stylistic coloring of the word formation stem, semantics and stylistic coloring of the affix or affixoid, the usual/non-usual character of the word formation method as an additional factor, as well as contextual features of the neologisms' use. It was revealed that the maximum degree of explicitness is characteristic of neologisms which combine a stem with negative evaluative semantics and an affix or affixoid that intensifies the evaluation. In the middle of the evaluative spectrum, there are neologisms containing a formant or a stem marked as evaluative (the closer the evaluative component is to the core of the semantics of the base, the more intensely the evaluation of the neologisms is expressed). The maximum degree of implicitness is characteristic of neologisms created on the basis of neutral elements, but acquiring evaluation in context because of metaphorization, under the influence of a language game, as well as in the course of implementing ironic speech strategies.
