Protective behaviors against COVID-19 and their association with psychological factors in China and South Korea during the Omicron wave : a comparative study

Copyright © 2024 The Royal Society for Public Health. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved..

OBJECTIVES: We aimed to explore the level of protective behaviors against COVID-19 and its association with psychological factors in China and South Korea during the Omicron wave.

STUDY DESIGN: Cross-sectional study.

METHODS: We conducted a population-based cross-sectional survey from March 15 to 30, 2023 in China and South Korea. Demographic characteristics, health status, protective behaviors, and psychological factors (including perceived risks, efficacy belief, attribution of disease, fear of COVID-19, trust and evaluation, fatalism, resilience, and pandemic fatigue) were investigated. After adjusting for sociodemographic and health-related factors, multivariable regression models were constructed to explore the psychological influencing factors of protective behavior.

RESULTS: A total of 3000 participants from China and 1000 participants from Korea were included in the final analysis. The mean performance score for protective behaviors among all respondents was 2.885 in China and 3.139 in Korea, with scores ranging from 1 to 4. In China, performance scores were higher in those who were female, aged 30-39, employed, married, living in urban areas, having the highest income level, having the best subjective health status, and having a history of chronic disease (P-value <0.05). In Korea, performance scores were higher for individuals who were female, over 50 years old, educated to high school or below, unemployed, married, had a history of chronic disease, and had never been infected with SARS-CoV-2 (P-value <0.05). In the multivariable regression model, perceived severity (β = 0.067), attribution of disease (β = 0.121), fear of COVID-19 (β = 0.128), trust and evaluation (β = 0.097), psychological resilience (β = 0.068), and efficacy belief (β = 0.216) were positively associated with the performance scores, pandemic fatigue (β = -0.089) was negatively associated with performance scores in China (P-value <0.05). However, in Korea, perceived susceptibility (β = 0.075), fear of COVID-19 (β = 0.107), and efficacy belief (β = 0.357) were positively associated with protective behaviors (P-value <0.05), trust and evaluation (β = -0.078) and pandemic fatigue (β = -0.063) were negatively associated with performance scores (P-value <0.05).

CONCLUSIONS: Populations in both China and Korea demonstrated great compliance with protective behaviors during the Omicron wave. Because of the sociocultural, economic, and political differences, there were differences in the association between psychological factors and protective behaviors in the two countries. This study, from the perspective of psychological factors in different cultural contexts, would provide references for increasing adherence to protective guidelines in future outbreaks of emerging infectious diseases.

Medienart:

E-Artikel

Erscheinungsjahr:

2024

Erschienen:

2024

Enthalten in:

Zur Gesamtaufnahme - volume:229

Enthalten in:

Public health - 229(2024) vom: 25. März, Seite 116-125

Sprache:

Englisch

Beteiligte Personen:

Deng, J [VerfasserIn]
Lee, M [VerfasserIn]
Qin, C [VerfasserIn]
Lee, Y [VerfasserIn]
You, M [VerfasserIn]
Liu, J [VerfasserIn]

Links:

Volltext

Themen:

COVID-19
Journal Article
Mental health
Omicron
Protective behaviors
Psychological factors

Anmerkungen:

Date Completed 26.03.2024

Date Revised 26.03.2024

published: Print-Electronic

Citation Status MEDLINE

doi:

10.1016/j.puhe.2024.02.002

funding:

Förderinstitution / Projekttitel:

PPN (Katalog-ID):

NLM369181263