Health Behavior and Attitudes During the COVID-19 Pandemic Among Vulnerable and Underserved Latinx in the Southwest USA.

The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted deep-rooted health disparities, particularly among Latinx immigrants living on the Mexico-US border. This article investigates differences between populations and adherence to COVID-19 preventive measures. This study investigated whether there are differences between Latinx recent immigrants, non-Latinx Whites, and English-speaking Latinx in their attitudes and adherence to COVID-19 preventive measures. Data came from 302 participants who received a free COVID-19 test at one of the project sites between March and July 2021. Participants lived in communities with poorer access to COVID-19 testing. Choosing to complete the baseline survey in Spanish was a proxy for being a recent immigrant. Survey measures included the PhenX Toolkit, COVID-19 mitigating behaviors, attitudes toward COVID-19 risk behaviors and mask wearing, and economic challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic. With multiple imputation, ordinary least squares (OLS) regression was used to analyze between-group differences in mitigating attitudes and behaviors toward COVID-19 risk. Adjusted OLS regression analyses showed that Latinx surveyed in Spanish perceived COVID-19 risk behaviors as more unsafe (b = 0.38, p = .001) and had stronger positive attitudes toward mask wearing (b = 0.58, p = .016), as compared to non-Latinx Whites. No significant differences emerged between Latinx surveyed in English and non-Latinx Whites (p > .05). Despite facing major structural, economic, and systemic disadvantages, recent Latinx immigrants showed more positive attitudes toward public health COVID-19 mitigating measures than other groups. The findings have implications for future prevention research about community resilience, practice, and policy.

Effectiveness of a Brief Mindfulness-Based Intervention of "STOP touching your face" During the COVID-19 Pandemic: a Randomized Controlled Trial.

Objectives: Avoiding touching the eyes, nose, and mouth (T-zone) is a strategy to reduce the spread of COVID-19. This study evaluated the effectiveness of a brief mindfulness-based intervention (MBI) named "STOP (Stop, Take a Breath, Observe, Proceed) touching your face" for reducing face-touching behavior. Methods: In this online-based, two-arm, wait-list, randomized controlled trial, eligible participants were randomly assigned to the intervention (n = 545) or control group (n = 545). The results of 60-min self-monitoring of face-touching behavior were reported before and after the intervention. Reduction of the percentage of T-zone touching was the primary outcome, and reduction of face-touching frequency was a key secondary outcome. Outcomes were analyzed on an intention-to-treat (ITT) basis with a complete case analysis (CCA). Results: ITT analysis revealed that the percentage of T-zone touching was significantly reduced by 8.1% in the intervention group (from 81.1 to 73.0%, RR = 0.901, OR = 0.631, RD = - 0.081, p = 0.002), and insignificantly reduced by 0.6% in the control group (from 80.0 to 79.4%, p = 0.821). Fewer participants performed T-zone touching in the intervention group than in the control group (73.0% vs. 79.4%, RR = 0.919, OR = 0.700, RD = - 0.064, p = 0.015) after the intervention, and there was a greater reduction of T-zone touching frequency in the intervention group than in the control group [mean ± SD: 1.7 ± 5.13 vs. 0.7 ± 3.98, mean difference (95% CI): 1.03 (0.48 to 1.58), p < 0.001, Cohen's d = - 0.218]. The above results were further confirmed by CCA. Conclusions: This brief mindfulness-based intervention was potentially effective at reducing the spread of COVID-19 and could be further investigated as an intervention for preventing other infectious diseases spread by hand-to-face touching. Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT04330352. Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12671-022-02019-x.

Social work research ethics in China: A scoping review of research involving human subjects during COVID-19.

As the first review to systematically explore the scope and application of Chinese social work research ethics, this study incorporated web-crawling technology in the scoping review process and identified 18 eligible studies from 1168 publications from January 2020 to July 2021. Findings suggest that social work scholars are aware of research ethics when conducting human subjects research in the Chinese population. Yet, many failed to fully demonstrate practical considerations of internationally accepted ethical principles (e.g. respect for persons). We discuss education on research ethics, new challenges of the digital age, and considerations of Chinese culture in developing ethical protocols for social work research in China.

Social Isolation and Anxiety Disorder During the COVID-19 Pandemic and Lockdown in China.

The COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown measures have had a profound impact on the emotions, anxiety, and mental health of affected communities. Despite this, there is a lack of knowledge about the possible generational and geographical differences in the effects on the mental health of individuals. This study examines the impact of COVID-19 related quarantine on symptoms of generalized anxiety disorders (GAD) among parents and children (N = 4503). It also compares the outcomes of residents from the initial COVID-19 epicenter of Wuhan to those in surrounding areas. Subgroup analyses were conducted by child and parent samples, and by Wuhan city and other cities in the Hubei province. Propensity score radius matching and ordinary least squares regressions were used to examine the relationship between quarantine and GAD symptoms. Results showed that quarantine had more psychological impact on parents than children, regardless of geographic location. Parents that experienced quarantine in Wuhan city, reported a significantly higher level of symptoms of GAD than those that did not. Parents from other cities showed no such difference. For both children and parents, interpersonal communication about COVID-19 and social media exposure to pandemic-related information were linked to GAD symptoms. Targeted policies and interventions are needed to address the psychological impacts of COVID-19 lockdown.

Alcohol Consumption in China Before and During COVID-19: Preliminary Results From an Online Retrospective Survey.

Background: Alcohol is an important aspect of Chinese culture, and alcohol use has been traditionally accepted in China. People with stress, anxiety, and depression may use more alcohol. More people reported symptoms of anxiety and depression during the outbreak of COVID-19. Thus, people may drink more alcohol during the outbreak of COVID-19 than before COVID-19. Methods: An online retrospective survey was conducted on a total sample of 2,229 participants. Drinking behaviors before and during COVID-19, current risky drinking and hazardous drinking, and the association between high-risk drinking and mental health problems (depression, anxiety, and stress) were assessed via self-reported measures on the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) and the 21-item Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS-21). Results: This study found that, compared with before COVID-19, alcohol consumption was slightly decreased during COVID-19 (from 3.5 drinks to 3.4 drinks, p = 0.035) in the overall sample. Most (78.7%) alcohol drinkers were males. Before and during COVID-19, males consumed more drinks per week (4.2 and 4.0 vs. 1.3 and 1.2 drinks), had a higher percentage of heavy drinking (8.1 and 7.7% vs. 4.4 and 2.7%), and more drinking days per week (2.1 and 2.1 vs. 1.0 and 0.9 days). Males also had more risky drinking (43.2 vs. 9.3%) and hazardous drinking (70.2 vs. 46.6%) than female counterparts. This study also found that high-risk drinking predicted anxiety in females. Conclusions: This study suggests a slight reduction in alcohol consumption during COVID-19. However, hazardous drinking is common, especially among male alcohol drinkers. Males consumed more alcohol, had more risky and hazardous drinking than female counterparts both before and during COVID-19. Public health policy makers should pay more attention to developing effective, population-based strategies to prevent harmful alcohol consumption.

Brief mindfulness-based intervention of 'STOP (Stop, Take a Breath, Observe, Proceed) touching your face': a study protocol of a randomised controlled trial.

INTRODUCTION: Face-touching behaviour often happens frequently and automatically, and poses potential risk for spreading infectious disease. Mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) have shown its efficacy in the treatment of behaviour disorders. This study aims to evaluate an online mindfulness-based brief intervention skill named 'STOP (Stop, Take a Breath, Observe, Proceed) touching your face' in reducing face-touching behaviour. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: This will be an online-based, randomised, controlled, trial. We will recruit 1000 participants, and will randomise and allocate participants 1:1 to the 'STOP touching your face' (both 750-word text and 5 min audio description by online) intervention group (n=500) and the wait-list control group (n=500). All participants will be asked to monitor and record their face-touching behaviour during a 60 min period before and after the intervention. Primary outcome will be the efficacy of short-term mindfulness-based 'STOP touching your face' intervention for reducing the frequency of face-touching. The secondary outcomes will be percentage of participants touching their faces; the correlation between the psychological traits of mindfulness and face-touching behaviour; and the differences of face-touching behaviour between left-handers and right-handers. Analysis of covariance, regression analysis, χ2 test, t-test, Pearson's correlations will be applied in data analysis. We will recruit 1000 participants from April to July 2020 or until the recruitment process is complete. The follow-up will be completed in July 2020. We expect all trial results to be available by the end of July 2020. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: The study protocol has been approved by the Ethics Committee of Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital, an affiliate of Zhejiang University, Medical College (No. 20200401-32). Study results will be disseminated via social media and peer-reviewed publications. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER: NCT04330352.