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Journal ArticleDOI

Older Adults' Risk Perception during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Lombardy Region of Italy: A Cross-sectional Survey.

TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigated risk perception in 514 adults over 60 years during the lockdown of COVID-19 pandemic and found that older adults perceived a lower risk of getting infected compared to younger adults.
Abstract: During COVID-19 pandemic, older adults are the segment of the population at higher health risk. Given the important role the risk perception has in influencing both the behaviors and psychological well-being, it appears useful exploring this factor in this segment of the population. Despite different studies already described the factors influencing the risk perception, few focused on older adults. For this reason, we investigated risk perception in 514 people over 60 years during the lockdown. We administered a structured interview collecting socio-demographic information, sources of information used, actions undertaken to avoid contagion, and risk perception. Risk perception related to COVID-19 was significantly lower than the perceived risk associated with other threats, and it was correlated to the number of sources of information used but not to the actions undertaken. Furthermore, we found higher risk perception in who knew infected persons, and a negative correlation between the risk perception and age, with the over 75 perceiving a lower risk of getting infected compared to the younger participants. Our results should be taken as informative for future studies. Indeed, further studies on the older adults and the risk perception during emergencies are needed to better orient both communication and supporting strategies.
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examined age-related differences in risk perception in the early stages of COVID-19 lockdown, analyzing variables that can explain the differences in perception of risk at different ages.
Abstract: Studies on age-related differences in risk perception in a real-world situation, such as the recent COVID-19 outbreak, showed that the risk perception of getting COVID-19 tends to decrease as age increases. This finding raised the question on what factors could explain risk perception in older adults. The present study examined age-related differences in risk perception in the early stages of COVID-19 lockdown, analyzing variables that can explain the differences in perception of risk at different ages. A total of 1,765 adults aged between 18 and 87 years old completed an online survey assessing perceived risk severity and risk vulnerability of getting COVID-19, sociodemographic status, emotional state, experience relating to COVID-19, and physical health status. Results showed that the older the participants, the lower the perceived vulnerability to getting COVID-19, but the higher the perceived severity. Different predictors explain the perception of risk severity and vulnerability at different ages. Overall, self-reported anxiety over the pandemic is a crucial predictor in explaining risk perceptions in all age groups. Theoretical and practical implications of the empirical findings are discussed.

52 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
10 Oct 2021-Vaccine
TL;DR: In this article, the authors synthesize a data-driven model for the predictors of COVID-19 vaccine willingness among dental students, i.e., the economic level of the country where the student lives and studies, trust of the pharmaceutical industry, the individual's misconception of natural immunity, belief of vaccines risk-benefit-ratio, and individual's attitudes toward novel vaccines.

27 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, a US nationally representative sample of 410 adults completed a survey about COVID-19 beliefs and prevention behaviors between June 12 and 18, 2020 and found that both Black and Latinx respondents thought it was more important to protect a variety of non-close others (e.g., people in their city or state).
Abstract: Controlling the COVID-19 pandemic has required communities to engage in prosocial action, including behaviors that may inconvenience individuals, but protect the collective (e.g., mask wearing, social distancing). The purpose of this study was to understand to what extent COVID-19 prosocial beliefs and behavior differ by race/ethnicity and why this might be the case. A US nationally representative sample of 410 adults completed a survey about COVID-19 beliefs and prevention behaviors between June 12 and 18, 2020. Compared to White respondents, Black respondents perceived the risk of COVID-19 to be greater to the US population; and both Black and Latinx respondents thought it was more important to protect a variety of non-close others (e.g., people in their city or state). Black and Latinx respondents engaged in several prevention behaviors, including social distancing, to a greater extent than White respondents. There were indirect effects of Black vs. White race on engaging in protective behaviors through greater perceived risk to others and beliefs in the importance of protecting distal others. Results indicate that targeted messages promoting prevention, including vaccination with pro-social messages, may resonate with communities of color. They also suggest that lower levels of prosocial beliefs among White people have likely hindered the US response to the epidemic.

6 citations

Posted ContentDOI
29 Jan 2021-medRxiv
TL;DR: In this article, the authors extracted tweets regarding COVID-19-related risk perceptions and developed index indicators for three dimensions of risk perceptions based on over 297 million geotagged tweets posted by over 3.5 million Twitter users from January to October 2020.
Abstract: Social media analysis provides a new approach to monitoring and understanding risk perceptions regarding COVID-19 over time. Our current understandings of risk perceptions regarding COVID-19 do not disentangle the three dimensions of risk perceptions (perceived susceptibility, perceived severity, and negative emotion) over a long enough timeframe to cover different pandemic phases. The impact of social determinants of health factors on COVID-19-related risk perceptions over time is also not clear. To address these two knowledge gaps, we extracted tweets regarding COVID-19-related risk perceptions and developed index indicators for three dimensions of risk perceptions based on over 297 million geotagged tweets posted by over 3.5 million Twitter users from January to October 2020 in the United States. We also examined correlations between index indicator scores and county-level social determinants of health factors. The three domains of risk perceptions demonstrate different trajectories. Perceived severity kept climbing throughout the whole study period. Perceived susceptibility and negative emotion declined and remained stable at a lower level after peaking on March 11 (WHO named COVID-19 a global pandemic). Attention on risk perceptions was not exactly in accordance with epidemic trends of COVID-19 (cases, deaths). Users from socioeconomically vulnerable counties showed lower attention on perceived severity and susceptibility of COVID-19 than those from wealthier counties. Examination of trends in tweets regarding the multiple domains of risk perceptions throughout stages of the COVID-19 pandemic can help policy makers frame in-time, tailored, and appropriate responses to prevent viral spread and encourage preventive behavior uptake in United States.

5 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article , an agent-based model that reflects the complex interplay between the spread of a pathogen and individual protective behaviors under the influence of media messaging is presented. But the model is unable to reproduce the empirical trends of fear and protective behavior in Germany but struggles to simulate the accurate scale of disease spread.
Abstract: Modeling infectious diseases has been shown to be of great importance and utility during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. From today's globalized information landscape, however, a plethora of new factors arise that have not been covered in previous models. In this paper, we present an agent-based model that reflects the complex interplay between the spread of a pathogen and individual protective behaviors under the influence of media messaging. We use the Rescorla-Wagner model of associative learning for the growth and extinction of fear, a factor that has been proposed as a major contributor in the determination of protective behavior. The model space, as well as heterogeneous social structures among the agents, are created from empirical data. We incorporate factors like age, gender, wealth, and attitudes towards public health institutions. The model is able to reproduce the empirical trends of fear and protective behavior in Germany but struggles to simulate the accurate scale of disease spread. The decline of fear seems to promote a second wave of disease and the model suggests that individual protective behavior has a significant impact on the outcome of the epidemic. The influence of media in the form of messages promoting protective behavior is negligible in the model. Further research regarding factors influencing long-term protective behavior is recommended to improve communication and mitigation strategies.

4 citations

References
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: A psychometric scale that assesses risk taking in five content domains: financial decisions (separately for investing versus gambling), health/safety, recreational, ethical, and social decisions is presented in this article.
Abstract: We present a psychometric scale that assesses risk taking in five content domains: financial decisions (separately for investing versus gambling), health/safety, recreational, ethical, and social decisions. Respondents rate the likelihood that they would engage in domain-specific risky activities (Part I). An optional Part II assesses respondents' perceptions of the magnitude of the risks and expected benefits of the activities judged in Part I. The scale's construct validity and consistency is evaluated for a sample of American undergraduate students. As expected, respondents' degree of risk taking was highly domain-specific, i.e. not consistently risk-averse or consistently risk-seeking across all content domains. Women appeared to be more risk-averse in all domains except social risk. A regression of risk taking (likelihood of engaging in the risky activity) on expected benefits and perceived risks suggests that gender and content domain differences in apparent risk taking are associated with differences in the perception of the activities' benefits and risk, rather than with differences in attitude towards perceived risk. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

1,799 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The psychological impact of stressful events related to an infectious disease outbreak may be mediated by peoples' perceptions of those events; altruism may help to protect some health care workers against these negative impacts.
Abstract: Objective:We examined the psychological impact of the 2003 outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) on hospital employees in Beijing, China.Methods:In 2006, randomly selected employees ...

1,237 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: A retrospective study of patients with new coronavirus pneumonia who were hospitalized in Hainan Provincial People's Hospital from January 15, 2020 to February 18, 2020, finds that elderly patients with COVID-19 are more likely to progress to severe disease.

1,219 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: High proportion of severe to critical cases and high fatality rate were observed in the elderly COVID-19 patients and close monitoring and timely treatment should be performed for the elderly patients at high risk.

941 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The COVID-19 pandemic was associated with mild stressful impact in a sample of local Chinese residents aged ≥18 years in Liaoning Province, mainland China, even though the pandemic is still ongoing.
Abstract: Our study aimed to investigate the immediate impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health and quality of life among local Chinese residents aged ≥18 years in Liaoning Province, mainland China. An online survey was distributed through a social media platform between January and February 2020. Participants completed a modified validated questionnaire that assessed the Impact of Event Scale (IES), indicators of negative mental health impacts, social and family support, and mental health-related lifestyle changes. A total of 263 participants (106 males and 157 females) completed the study. The mean age of the participants was 37.7 ± 14.0 years, and 74.9% had a high level of education. The mean IES score in the participants was 13.6 ± 7.7, reflecting a mild stressful impact. Only 7.6% of participants had an IES score ≥26. The majority of participants (53.3%) did not feel helpless due to the pandemic. On the other hand, 52.1% of participants felt horrified and apprehensive due to the pandemic. Additionally, the majority of participants (57.8–77.9%) received increased support from friends and family members, increased shared feeling and caring with family members and others. In conclusion, the COVID-19 pandemic was associated with mild stressful impact in our sample, even though the COVID-19 pandemic is still ongoing. These findings would need to be verified in larger population studies.

933 citations