ABSTRACT

Despite the rapid transmission of and death toll claimed by COVID-19, there is evidence of resistance toward behaviors shown to effectively prevent and slow the spread of the disease, such as mask wearing and social distancing. This study applies psychological reactance theory to examine COVID-19 message factors (i.e., message fatigue, issue importance) that may be linked to nonadherence to CDC recommendations via the experience of reactance. Participants (N = 268) were current U.S. residents over the age of 18 who completed an online survey about their perceptions of COVID-19 messaging in general as well as toward a specific COVID-19 message they recalled. Results of structural equation modeling indicated that perceived freedom threat toward a COVID-19 message was predicted positively by message fatigue and negatively by issue importance. Greater perceived freedom threat was linked to greater reactance, which in turn was associated with lower levels of adherence to hygiene- and social-related COVID-19 preventive behavior. Notably, the negative association between reactance and social-related adherence was stronger than that between reactance and hygiene-related adherence. Implications for the role of reactance in risk and crisis communication as well as for public health messaging during the COVID-19 pandemic are discussed.

摘要

尽管 COVID-19 传播迅速且死亡人数众多，但有证据表明，人们对有效预防和减缓疾病传播的行为（例如戴口罩和保持社交距离）产生了抵触情绪。本研究应用心理抗拒理论来检查 COVID-19 消息因素（即消息疲劳、问题重要性），这些因素可能通过抗拒经验与不遵守 CDC 建议相关联。参与者（N= 268）是目前 18 岁以上的美国居民，他们完成了一项关于他们对 COVID-19 消息的总体看法以及他们回忆起的特定 COVID-19 消息的看法的在线调查。结构方程模型的结果表明，消息疲劳对 COVID-19 消息的感知自由威胁有积极的预测，而问题的重要性有消极的预测。更大的感知自由威胁与更大的反抗有关，而反抗又与较低水平的对卫生和社会相关的 COVID-19 预防行为的遵守有关。值得注意的是，反抗与社会相关依从性之间的负相关性强于反抗与卫生相关依从性之间的负相关。