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How Stay-at-Home Orders Interact with COVID-19 Misperceptions and Individuals' Social Distancing Intentions
Michele Boehm1, Allie White2, Amy Bleakley2
1Department of Communication, University of Delaware, 125 Academy St., Newark, DE, 19716, USA. mboehm@udel.edu.
Journal of Prevention (2022)
|May 13, 2022
Summary
State-mandated stay-at-home orders during COVID-19 enhance the impact of public knowledge on social distancing self-efficacy. These policies strengthen the link between what people know and their confidence in following guidelines.
Area of Science:
- Public Health
- Health Psychology
- Sociology
Background:
- COVID-19 pandemic necessitated public health interventions like stay-at-home orders.
- Understanding public behavior is crucial for effective pandemic response.
- The Ideological Health Spirals Model (IHSM) provides a framework for analyzing health behaviors.
Purpose of the Study:
- To examine the influence of state-mandated stay-at-home orders on COVID-19 related knowledge, beliefs, and behaviors.
- To analyze the moderating effect of stay-at-home orders on the relationship between knowledge and self-efficacy in social distancing.
- To assess the association between intention to socially distance and attitudes, norms, and self-efficacy.
Main Methods:
- Utilized the Ideological Health Spirals Model (IHSM).
- Collected data from 1000 US adults in Spring 2020.
- Employed path analyses to examine relationships between variables.
Main Results:
- Stay-at-home orders moderated the relationship between COVID-19 knowledge and self-efficacy for social distancing.
- Intention to socially distance was significantly associated with attitudes, norms, and self-efficacy.
- Policy interventions can enhance the effect of knowledge on behavioral determinants.
Conclusions:
- State-mandated stay-at-home orders can amplify the impact of public knowledge on social distancing behaviors.
- Understanding psychological determinants is key to promoting adherence to public health policies.
- The findings support the role of policy in shaping health behaviors during pandemics.
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