The impact of stay-at-home orders on vulnerability assessments and precautionary intentions during a pandemic

ABSTRACT

In 2020, a novel emerging infectious disease – COVID-19 – became a global pandemic and prompted unprecedented social distancing measures. We examined the associations of voluntary stay-at-home (SAH) orders during the COVID-19 pandemic with vulnerability assessments and precautionary intentions (e.g. social distancing, hand washing). A quasi-experimental study using an online adult sample was conducted in U.S. states with and without voluntary SAH orders during the COVID-19 pandemic. Self-report surveys assessed vulnerability assessments and precautionary intentions. Participants living in states with SAH orders showed inflated vulnerability assessments for contracting COVID-19, and this association was stronger for affect-laden than cognitively-based assessments. Moreover, only affect-laden vulnerability assessments were uniquely associated with precautionary intentions and accounted for the relationship between SAH orders and precautionary intentions. Our study was among the first to explore the impact of voluntary SAH orders on vulnerability assessments and precautionary intentions. Results are discussed in terms of their implications for health behavioral models and applications for promoting self-protective actions during a pandemic.

KEYWORDS:

• Risk perception
• infectious disease
• COVID-19
• behavioral intentions
• affect and cognition

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Given that data collection occurred immediately before SAH orders were implemented in any state, this allowed us to further sub-divide participants in the stay-at-home order absent group into those who completed the study 1) prior to any SAH orders being issued (n = 62) or 2) after SAH orders were issued but not in their home state (n = 80). Analyses did not reveal any significant differences between these two sub-groups. Thus, given the non-significant nature of these results, and to increase clarity, we combined these sub-groups for core analyses.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.