Coping efficacy is associated with the domain specificity in risk-taking behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic

The current study is to explore the associations between the threat to life and risk-taking behaviors across different domains during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), and the role of the perceived threat and coping efficacy in these associations based on protection motivation theory. This study conducted an online survey on 2983 participants from 30 provinces in China. It found that people's risk-taking behaviors in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic could be divided into stimulating risk-taking (SRT) behaviors and instrumental risk-taking (IRT) behaviors. The exposure level to the COVID-19 pandemic was negatively related to SRT behaviors in natural/physical, gambling, safety, moral, and reproductive domains, but not related to IRT behaviors in financial and corporation/competition domains. Two parallel routes were found in domain-specific risk-taking behaviors when people were faced with a life-threatening epidemic. Specifically, perceived threat consistently mediated the positive relationship between exposure level and risk-taking behaviors across domains. In contrast, coping efficacy mediated the negative relationship between exposure level and SRT behaviors but positive associations with IRT behaviors. These findings indicated that coping efficacy, rather than perceived threat is the factor that explains the people's domain-specific risk-taking behaviors in the context of the epidemic. The study holds implications for emergency policy-making that targets disaster risk reduction by increasing the public coping efficacy, which could prevent unnecessary SRT behaviors and improve necessary IRT behaviors in business and investment for economic recoveries.