Community outbreak moderates the association between COVID-19-related behaviors and COVID-19 fear among older people: a one-year longitudinal study in Taiwan

Kuo, Y-J, Chen, Y-P, Wang, H-W, Liu, C-h, Strong, C, Saffari, M, Ko, N-Y, Lin, C-Y and Griffiths, MD ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8880-6524, 2021. Community outbreak moderates the association between COVID-19-related behaviors and COVID-19 fear among older people: a one-year longitudinal study in Taiwan. Frontiers in Medicine, 8: 756985. ISSN 2296-858X

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Abstract

Although health behavior theories indicate that fear is effective in activating preventive behaviors, the question of whether COVID-19 severity moderates the association between fear of COVID-19 and preventive behaviors remains unclear. The present study investigated the association between the fear of COVID-19 and preventive behaviors during the COVID-19 community outbreak of two severity levels in Taiwan. Data were obtained regarding the fear of COVID-19 and practice of preventive behaviors from 139 older people (mean age = 71.73 years; 30.2% men) through in-person interviews during a mild COVID-19 outbreak period (baseline assessment). Data from 126 of the 139 participants were obtained again through a telephone interview during a severe COVID-19 outbreak period (follow-up assessment). A significant increase in the fear of COVID-19 (d = 0.39, p < 0.001) and a decrease in preventive behaviors (d = 0.63, p < 0.001) were found in the follow-up assessment. The association between fear of COVID-19 and preventive behaviors was not significant at baseline (r = −0.07, p > 0.05) but became significant at the follow-up assessment (r = 0.32, p < 0.001). The severity of a COVID-19 outbreak may alter older people’s psychological status and related behaviors.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	Frontiers in Medicine
Creators:	Kuo, Y.-J., Chen, Y.-P., Wang, H.-W., Liu, C.-H., Strong, C., Saffari, M., Ko, N.-Y., Lin, C.-Y. and Griffiths, M.D.
Publisher:	Frontiers Media SA
Date:	17 December 2021
Volume:	8
ISSN:	2296-858X
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.3389/fmed.2021.756985 DOI 1504932 Other
Rights:	© 2021 Kuo, Chen, Wang, Liu, Strong, Saffari, Ko, Lin and Griffiths This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
Divisions:	Schools > School of Social Sciences
Record created by:	Jeremy Silvester
Date Added:	06 Jan 2022 10:30
Last Modified:	06 Jan 2022 10:30
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/45176

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