Contextualising COVID-19 prevention behaviour over time in Australia: Patterns and long-term predictors from April to July 2020 in an online social media sample

  1. Julie Ayre
  2. Erin Cvejic
  3. Kirsten McCaffery
  4. Tessa Copp
  5. Samuel Cornell
  6. Rachael H. Dodd
  7. Kristen Pickles
  8. Carys Batcup
  9. Jennifer M. J. Isautier
  10. Brooke Nickel
  11. Thomas Dakin
  12. Carissa Bonner

Reviewed by

Read the full article

Discuss this preprint

Start a discussion What are Sciety discussions?

Listed in

Log in to save this article

Abstract

In Australia in March 2020 a national public health directive required that non-essential workers stay at home, except for essential activities. These restrictions began easing in May 2020 as community transmission slowed.

Objectives

This study investigated changes in COVID prevention behaviours from April-July 2020, and psychosocial predictors of these behaviours.

Methods

An Australia-wide (national) survey was conducted in April, with monthly follow-up over four months. Participants who were adults (18+ years), currently residing in Australia and who could read and understand English were eligible. Recruitment was via online social media. Analysis sample included those who provided responses to the baseline survey (April) and at least one subsequent follow-up survey (N = 1834 out of a possible 3216 who completed the April survey). 71.7% of the sample was female (n = 1,322). Principal components analysis (PCA) combined self-reported adherence across seven prevention behaviours. PCA identified two behaviour types: ‘distancing’ (e.g. staying 1.5m away) and ‘hygiene’ (e.g. washing hands), explaining 28.3% and 24.2% of variance, respectively. Distancing and hygiene behaviours were analysed individually using multivariable regression models.

Results

On average, participants agreed with statements of adherence for all behaviours (means all above 4 out of 7). Distancing behaviours declined each month (p’s < .001), whereas hygiene behaviours remained relatively stable. For distancing, stronger perceptions of societal risk, self-efficacy to maintain distancing, and greater perceived social obligation at baseline were associated with adherence in June and July (p’s<0.05). For hygiene, the only significant correlate of adherence in June and July was belief that one’s actions could prevent infection of family members (p < .001).

Conclusion

High adherence to COVID prevention behaviours were reported in this social media sample; however, distancing behaviours tended to decrease over time. Belief in social responsibility may be an important aspect to consider in encouraging distancing behaviours. These findings have implications for managing a shift from government-imposed restrictions to individual responsibility.

Article activity feed

  1. Version published to 10.1371/journal.pone.0253930
  2. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2021.02.04.21251165: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board StatementIRB: This study was approved by The University of Sydney Human Research Ethics Committee (2020/212).
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    Statistical Analysis: Statistical analyses were conducted using Stata/IC v16.1 (StataCorp, College Station, TX, USA).
    StataCorp
    suggested: (Stata, RRID:SCR_012763)

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:
    Strengths and limitations: This study has several strengths. Firstly, the findings are contextualised within the Australian experience of the pandemic, which by international standards responded well to the pandemic and may serve as a model for international comparison. By following participants over a period of four months this study is able to provide valuable insight into relative differences in COVID-19 prevention behaviours across three vastly different scenarios: 1) new nationally-imposed restrictions; 2) low and stable daily cases of COVID-19 during eased restrictions; and 3) increasing numbers of daily cases. Secondly, by analysing COVID-19 prevention behaviours collectively, this study conserves statistical power, reduces the Type 1 error rate, and provides a typology of these behaviours that may be useful for future strategic planning. We also acknowledge this study’s limitations. Interpretation of some of these items may have changed over time. For example, the sense of ‘distancing’ may have changed in Australia between April and July. In April, during national restrictions, government advice on distancing clearly made reference to strangers as well as family and friends. As social venues such as restaurants have opened up, distancing is more likely to refer to strangers and implicitly excludes close friends or family. If this is the case and the ‘meaning’ of distancing has become less conservative over time, this current analysis may underestimate the decrease in ...

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    About SciScore

    SciScore is an automated tool that is designed to assist expert reviewers by finding and presenting formulaic information scattered throughout a paper in a standard, easy to digest format. SciScore checks for the presence and correctness of RRIDs (research resource identifiers), and for rigor criteria such as sex and investigator blinding. For details on the theoretical underpinning of rigor criteria and the tools shown here, including references cited, please follow this link.

  3. Version published to 10.1101/2021.02.04.21251165 on medRxiv