Chinese public’s knowledge, perceived severity, and perceived controllability of COVID-19 and their associations with emotional and behavioural reactions, social participation, and precautionary behaviour: a national survey

BMC Public Health

An Yang¹  Jian-Bin Li²  Ming-Chen Zhang³  Kai Dou³  Lin-Xin Wang³  Xiao-Qi Lin³ 

[1] Department of Applied Psychology, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, Guangzhou, P. R. China;Department of Early Childhood Education, The Education University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, P. R. China;Department of Psychology and Research Center of Adolescent Psychology and Behavior, School of Education, Guangzhou University, 230, Waihuan Road West, Panyu District, Guangzhou, P. R. China;

关键词: COVID-19;    Cognitive appraisal;    Psychological health;    Social participation;    Precautionary behaviour;   

DOI  :  10.1186/s12889-020-09695-1

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundThe outbreak of the coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) has caused enormous stress among the public in China. Intellectual input from various aspects is needed to fight against COVID-19, including understanding of the public’s emotion and behaviour and their antecedents from the psychological perspectives. Drawing upon the cognitive appraisal theory, this study examined three cognitive appraisals (i.e., perceived severity, perceived controllability, and knowledge of COVID-19) and their associations with a wide range of emotional and behavioural outcomes among the Chinese public.MethodsParticipants were 4607 citizens (age range: 17–90 years, Mage = 23.71 years) from 31 provinces in China and they took part in a cross-sectional survey online.ResultsThe results showed that the public’s emotional and behavioural reactions were slightly affected by the outbreak of COVID-19. Moreover, the public had limited participation in the events regarding COVID-19 but actively engaged in precautionary behaviour. In addition, results of structural equation model with latent variables revealed that the three appraisals were differentially related to the outcome variables (i.e., negative emotion, positive emotion, sleep problems, aggression, substance use, mobile phone use, social participation, and precautionary behaviour).ConclusionsThe findings highlight the utility of cognitive appraisal, as a core process of coping stress, in explaining the public’s emotion and behaviour in the encounter of public health concern. Practically, the findings facilitate the government and practitioners to design and deliver targeted intervention programs to the public.

【 授权许可】

CC BY