Risk perceptions and COVID-19 protective behaviors: A two-wave longitudinal study of epidemic and post-epidemic periods.

We investigated how perceived risk and protective behaviors changed as the coronavirus epidemic progressed. A longitudinal sample of 538 people responded to a COVID-19 risk perception questionnaire during the outbreak and post-epidemic periods. Using Structural Equation Modeling (SEM), we examined the mean level change of selected constructs and differences in their relationships. We tested a risk perception pathway in which affective attitude, informed by experience, shaped risk perceptions and protective behaviors. The model also postulated a social pathway in which cultural worldviews, like individualism and hierarchy, predicted risk perceptions and protective behaviors through social norms. Latent mean difference analyses revealed a decrease in social distancing behaviors and an increase in hygiene-cleanliness, corresponding to a reduction in risk perceptions and social norms and a rise in direct and indirect experience, while affective attitude remained substantially stable. Cross-sectional and longitudinal path analyses showed that affective risk perception, primarily informed by affective attitude, and social norms promoted behavior consistency regardless of epidemic contingencies. Instead, analytic risk perceptions were linked to protective behaviors only during the outbreak. Although risk perceptions dropped over time, analytic risk perceptions dropped more steeply than affective risk perceptions. Our findings supported the distinction between affective and deliberative processes in risk perception, reinforcing the view that affective reactions are needed to deploy analytic processes. Our study also supports the claim that perceived social norms are essential to understanding cultural worldview-related protective behaviors variability.

Explaining Chinese Reactions to COVID-19 During the Outbreak: A Systematic Illustration.

Objective: This research attempts to explore systematically factors that influence public reactions during COVID-19 pandemic, including different measures of risk perceptions, public trust in different levels of governments, and attention to news. Methods: This research uses a national stratified random sample of Chinese population and multiple linear regressions to explore the potential predictors of public reactions to coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19). Results: This research found that the effects of attentions to news, provincial experience, trust in government, demographics, and political cultures on risk perceptions depend on measures of risk perceptions, risk judgments vs. cognitive vs. affective risk perceptions. Moreover, the effect of culture on trust in government is consistent across different levels of government, trust in local, provincial, and central governments; living in the epicenter of COVID-19 in China decreases trust in local/provincial government but not trust in central government; public attention to news can bring both positive (trust in government) and negative (negative affect) outcomes. Finally, it confirmed positive associations among risk perception, subjective knowledge, and attention to news. Conclusion: The findings suggest challenges for risk communication.