Helping heart: Exploring the determinants of helping behavior in the time of social distancing

ABSTRACT

To reduce and control the spread of COVID-19, people are advised and even forced by law to maintain social distancing when they step out of their homes. The lockdown norms laid down by the government have impacted the nature of social interaction and various forms of behavior including participation in prosocial activities. The present study explores the determinants of helping in the context of COVID-19 pandemic and social distancing measures. The theory of planned behavior framework was taken to predict youth’s intentions and actual help for two kinds of helping behavior: donation for the people affected by the pandemic and feeding stray animals during lockdown. University students (N = 200) volunteered for the online survey, scales were used to measure their attitude, normative beliefs, perceived behavioral control, intention to help, and self-reported help during COVID-19 lockdown. The path analysis was used to test the model. Attitude and perceived behavioral control had a strong effect on the intention to help which further predicts actual self-reported help. Results also showed that since the nature of both helping behaviors was different so the relationship between the two was not strong. The results and implications are discussed in light of the present context.

KEYWORDS:

• Theory of planned behavior
• donation
• stray animals
• lockdown
• behavioral beliefs
• normative beliefs
• control beliefs

Acknowledgments

Authors would like to acknowledge the help received from Mr. Viplav Tuladhar and Mr. Tsering Thargay to improve the manuscript.

Declaration of interest statement

The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.