scholarly journals A Mixed Methods Study of Public Perception of Social Distancing: Integrating Qualitative and Computational Analyses for Text Data

2021 ◽  
pp. 155868982110208
Author(s):  
Pauline Ho ◽  
Kaiping Chen ◽  
Anqi Shao ◽  
Luye Bao ◽  
Angela Ai ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Health Behavior ◽  
Public Perception ◽  
Health Study ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Persuasive Messages ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
Social Distancing ◽  
Qualitative Approaches ◽  
Reported Health

In a rapidly changing public health crisis such as COVID-19, researchers need innovative approaches that can effectively link qualitative approaches and computational methods. In this article, computational and qualitative methods are used to analyze survey data collected in March 2020 ( n = 2,270) to explore the content of persuasive messages and their relationship with self-reported health behavior—that is, social distancing. Results suggest that persuasive messages, based on participants’ perspectives, vary by gender and race and are associated with self-reported health behavior. This article illustrates how qualitative analysis and structural topic modeling can be used in synergy in a public health study to understand the public’s perception and behavior related to science issues. Implications for health communication and future research are discussed.

scholarly journals Architecture, urbanism and health in a post-pandemic virtual world

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Beatriz Maturana ◽  
Ashraf M. Salama ◽  
Anthony McInneny
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Built Environment ◽  
Urban Environments ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Global Public Health ◽  
Virus Spread ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Social Distancing ◽  
Architectural Research

PurposeThe highly contagious coronavirus and the rapid spread of COVID-19 disease have generated a global public health crisis. Crises are being addressed at various local and global scales through social distancing measures and guidelines, emerging working and living patterns and the utilisation of technology to partially replace physical learning environments. The purpose of this article is to capture the key messages of the contributions published in this special edition of Archnet-IJAR: International Journal of Architectural Research, Volume 15, Issue 1, March 2021. Reviewing more than 70 submissions, 15 articles have been identified that are contributed by 35 scholars, educators and practitioners from 12 countries. The article calls for the need to embed trans-disciplinarity in current and future built environment research.Design/methodology/approachDriven by the fact that architecture, urban design and planning and built environment studies interact and have direct correlation with public health and virus spread. The approach to develop and present the key messages of the contributions is premised on three areas: (a) the pandemic condition as it relates to the built environment, (b) analytical reflections on the emerging themes and (c) the diversity and complexity embedded in these themes.FindingsWhile some contributions speak to the particularities of their contexts, others address regional or global parameters. The enquiry into architectural research, architectural education and architectural design indicates some of the important methods and tools to address the accelerated adoption, adaption and redesign needed to create a new and better normal which embeds flexibility, adaptability and continuous learning. The papers represent brilliant investiture to address the momentous insinuations the COVID-19 condition has on the built environment.Research limitations/implicationsThe diversity of implications reveals potential alternative futures for urbanity and society and the associated education and practice of future built environment professions. While the contributions invite us to critically envisage possibilities for future research and collective action, critical fast-track empirical research is needed to address how health is an integral component in the production of architecture and urban environments.Originality/valueThe diversity, complexity, depth and breadth of the contribution convey important insights on people, health and the spatial environments that accommodate both. Trans-disciplinarity, as it relates to research and action and to the production of urban environments, is viewed as a form of learning involving co-operation among different parts of society, professionals and academia in order to meet complex challenges of society such this pandemic condition. This approach has enabled the identification of three future research areas in architecture urbanism that include implications of virus spread on urban environments, how spatial and social distancing measures and protocols are altering our understanding of spatial design.

scholarly journals Investigating Community Pharmacy Take Home Naloxone Dispensing during COVID-19: The Impact of One Public Health Crisis on Another

Pharmacy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 129
Author(s):  
George Daskalakis ◽  
Ashley Cid ◽  
Kelly Grindrod ◽  
Michael A. Beazely
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Community Pharmacy ◽  
Online Survey ◽  
Comfort Level ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
Public Health Crisis ◽  
Pharmacy Technicians ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Overdose Deaths

A recent report found that the number of opioid-related deaths in Ontario in the first 15 weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic was 38.2% higher than in the 15 weeks before the pandemic. Our study sought to determine if pharmacy professionals self-reported an increase or decrease in naloxone provision due to the pandemic and to identify adjustments made by pharmacy professionals to dispense naloxone during the pandemic. A total of 231 Ontario community pharmacy professionals completed an online survey. Pharmacy professionals’ barriers, facilitators, and comfort level with dispensing naloxone before and during the pandemic were identified. The sample consisted of mostly pharmacists (99.1%). Over half (51.1%) reported no change in naloxone dispensing, while 22.9% of respondents reported an increase and 24.7% a decrease. The most common adjustments made during the pandemic were training patients how to administer naloxone over video or phone, delivering naloxone kits, and pharmacy technicians offering naloxone at prescription intake. Over half (55%) of participants said the top barrier for dispensing was that patients did not request naloxone. Naloxone distribution through pharmacies could be further optimized to address the increased incidence of overdose deaths during the pandemic. Future research should investigate the reasons for changes in naloxone dispensing.

The Emergence of COVID-19 in the US: A Public Health and Political Communication Crisis

2020 ◽  
Vol 45 (6) ◽  
pp. 967-981 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah E. Gollust ◽  
Rebekah H. Nagler ◽  
Erika Franklin Fowler
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Political Communication ◽  
Initial Response ◽  
The United States ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Attitudes And Beliefs ◽  
Health Issues ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Us

Abstract The coronavirus public health crisis is also a political-communication and health-communication crisis. In this article, the authors describe the key communication-related phenomena and evidence of concerning effects manifested in the United States during the initial response to the pandemic. The authors outline the conditions of communication about coronavirus that contribute to deleterious outcomes, including partisan cueing, conflicting science, downplayed threats, emotional arousal, fragmented media, and Trump's messaging. The authors suggest these have contributed to divergent responses by media sources, partisan leaders, and the public alike, leading to different attitudes and beliefs as well as varying protective actions taken by members of the public to reduce their risk. In turn, these divergent communication phenomena will likely amplify geographic variation in and inequities with COVID-19 disease outcomes. The authors conclude with some suggestions for future research, particularly surrounding communication about health inequity and strategies for reducing partisan divergence in views of public health issues in the future.

scholarly journals Pediatric Mental and Behavioral Health in the Period of Quarantine and Social Distancing With COVID-19

10.2196/19867 ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. e19867 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jiancheng Ye
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Behavioral Health ◽  
Psychological Trauma ◽  
Mental Illnesses ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Clinical Practices ◽  
Social Distancing ◽  
Health Technologies ◽  
The World

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has spread rapidly throughout the world and has had a long-term impact. The pandemic has caused great harm to society and caused serious psychological trauma to many people. Children are a vulnerable group in this global public health emergency, as their nervous systems, endocrine systems, and hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axes are not well developed. Psychological crises often cause children to produce feelings of abandonment, despair, incapacity, and exhaustion, and even raise the risk of suicide. Children with mental illnesses are especially vulnerable during the quarantine and social distancing period. The inclusion of psychosocial support for children and their families are part of the health responses to disaster and disaster recovery. Based on the biopsychosocial model, some children may have catastrophic thoughts and be prone to experience despair, numbness, flashbacks, and other serious emotional and behavioral reactions. In severe cases, there may be symptoms of psychosis or posttraumatic stress disorder. Timely and appropriate protections are needed to prevent the occurrence of psychological and behavioral problems. The emerging digital applications and health services such as telehealth, social media, mobile health, and remote interactive online education are able to bridge the social distance and support mental and behavioral health for children. Based on the psychological development characteristics of children, this study also illustrates interventions on the psychological impact from the COVID-19 pandemic. Even though the world has been struggling to curb the influences of the pandemic, the quarantine and social distancing policies will have long-term impacts on children. Innovative digital solutions and informatics tools are needed more than ever to mitigate the negative consequences on children. Health care delivery and services should envision and implement innovative paradigms to meet broad well-being needs and child health as the quarantine and social distancing over a longer term becomes a new reality. Future research on children's mental and behavioral health should pay more attention to novel solutions that incorporate cutting edge interactive technologies and digital approaches, leveraging considerable advances in pervasive and ubiquitous computing, human-computer interaction, and health informatics among many others. Digital approaches, health technologies, and informatics are supposed to be designed and implemented to support public health surveillance and critical responses to children’s growth and development. For instance, human-computer interactions, augmented reality, and virtual reality could be incorporated to remote psychological supporting service for children’s health; mobile technologies could be used to monitor children’s mental and behavioral health while protecting their individual privacy; big data and artificial intelligence could be used to support decision making on whether children should go out for physical activities and whether schools should be reopened. Implications to clinical practices, psychological therapeutic practices, and future research directions to address current effort gaps are highlighted in this study.

scholarly journals Self-reported compliance and attitudes about social distancing during the COVID-19 outbreak

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brauer Group Lab
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
Social Distancing ◽  
Public Health Crisis ◽  
Self Reports ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Public Health Officials ◽  
The Media ◽  
Nationally Representative ◽  
News Networks

We studied self-reports of social distancing in a nationally representative survey of U.S. adults. We found that younger, less educated individuals who do not see social distancing as effective or the norm are currently less likely to fully comply with social distancing recommendations. Barriers such as not being able to tolerate social distancing for a long time prevent individuals from doing so, while seeing how distancing can help one's family and others is a potential benefit that could be made salient to encourage compliance. Communication campaigns aimed at increasing social distancing should use trusted sources such as public health officials and should work through national news networks and social media, as these are the media most used by the individuals whose behavior we need to change to address the current public health crisis.

scholarly journals Working Memory Capacity Predicts Individual Differences in Social Distancing Compliance during the COVID-19 Pandemic in the U.S.

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Weizhen Xie ◽  
Stephen Campbell ◽  
Weiwei Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Working Memory ◽  
Individual Differences ◽  
Early Stage ◽  
Working Memory Capacity ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Unique Contribution ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
Social Distancing ◽  
The Individual

Noncompliance with social distancing during the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic poses a great challenge to the public health system. These noncompliance behaviors partly reflect people’s concerns for the inherent costs of social distancing while discounting its public health benefits. We propose that this oversight may be associated with the limitation in one’s mental capacity to simultaneously retain multiple pieces of information in working memory (WM) for rational decision making that leads to social distancing compliance. We tested this hypothesis in 850 U.S. residents during the first 2 weeks following the presidential declaration of national emergency because of the COVID-19 pandemic. We found that participants’ social distancing compliance at this initial stage could be predicted by individual differences in WM capacity, partly due to increased awareness of benefits over costs of social distancing among higher WM capacity individuals. Critically, the unique contribution of WM capacity to the individual differences in social distancing compliance could not be explained by other psychological and socioeconomic factors (e.g., moods, personality, education, and income levels). Furthermore, the critical role of WM capacity in social distancing compliance can be generalized to the compliance with another set of rules for social interactions, namely the fairness norm, in Western cultures. Collectively, our data reveal novel contributions of a core cognitive process underlying social distancing compliance during the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic, highlighting a potential cognitive venue for developing strategies to mitigate a public health crisis.

scholarly journals The Health Behavior Model of Personality in the Context of a Public Health Crisis

2021 ◽  
Vol Publish Ahead of Print ◽  
Author(s):  
Emily C. Willroth ◽  
Angela M. Smith ◽  
Amanda J. Shallcross ◽  
Eileen K. Graham ◽  
Daniel K. Mroczek ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Health Behavior ◽  
Behavior Model ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
Public Health Crisis ◽  
Health Behavior Model

scholarly journals Longitudinal Evidence of How Media Audiences Differ in Public Health Perceptions and Behaviors During a Global Pandemic

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Frissen ◽  
David De Coninck ◽  
Koenraad Matthys ◽  
Leen d'Haenens
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Health Behaviors ◽  
News Media ◽  
Linear Regression Analysis ◽  
Media Exposure ◽  
Cumulative Exposure ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
Reported Health ◽  
And Behaviors ◽  
Media Channels

The current study investigates how public attitudes and perceptions about the COVID-19 pandemic evolve over time and influence self-reported health behaviors (e. g., social distancing). Specific attention was paid to respondents' exposure to different news media channels (public vs. commercial). We used data from a two-wave panel study with a 3-week interval (W1 at the start and W2 at the peak of the pandemic) and a large sample of the adult population in Flanders, Belgium (n = 870). The results of mixed ANOVAs indicate that besides a time-effect there was also a significant effect of the different types of news media exposure and respondents' support for protective health measures and behaviors. Whereas, perceived vulnerability to disease, feelings of loneliness, and solidarity were mostly determined by respondents' overall frequency of media exposure, support of governmental measures and self-reported health behaviors were mostly determined by the type of news media exposure. Respondents with a predominantly public/quality news media diet had the highest scores on these variables. A stepwise linear regression analysis with individual's change scores demonstrated that (self-)protective behavior was positively determined by respondents' age, solidarity, and the belief that the measures are necessary, but negatively determined by one's cumulative exposure to commercial/tabloid news media. This longitudinal study provides a new perspective on the role of news media in times of a public health crisis. It offers support for (A) the “double bind hypothesis” (i.e., while news media consumption encourages (self-)isolation, it fosters feelings of loneliness); and (B) the “dual effects hypothesis” (i.e., exposure to commercial/tabloid news media generates different outcomes than exposure to public/quality news media). Affective responses and socio-psychological perceptions are influenced by overall news media exposure, whereas support for the government and its handling of the crisis are mainly determined by one's selection of media channels, whereby audiences of public news media evaluate these outcomes more positively than the audiences of commercial news media channels.

scholarly journals Working memory capacity predicts individual differences in social-distancing compliance during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States

2020 ◽  
Vol 117 (30) ◽  
pp. 17667-17674 ◽  
Author(s):  
Weizhen Xie ◽  
Stephen Campbell ◽  
Weiwei Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
United States ◽  
Working Memory ◽  
Individual Differences ◽  
Early Stage ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
The United States ◽  
Unique Contribution ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
Social Distancing

Noncompliance with social distancing during the early stage of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic poses a great challenge to the public health system. These noncompliance behaviors partly reflect people’s concerns for the inherent costs of social distancing while discounting its public health benefits. We propose that this oversight may be associated with the limitation in one’s mental capacity to simultaneously retain multiple pieces of information in working memory (WM) for rational decision making that leads to social-distancing compliance. We tested this hypothesis in 850 United States residents during the first 2 wk following the presidential declaration of national emergency because of the COVID-19 pandemic. We found that participants’ social-distancing compliance at this initial stage could be predicted by individual differences in WM capacity, partly due to increased awareness of benefits over costs of social distancing among higher WM capacity individuals. Critically, the unique contribution of WM capacity to the individual differences in social-distancing compliance could not be explained by other psychological and socioeconomic factors (e.g., moods, personality, education, and income levels). Furthermore, the critical role of WM capacity in social-distancing compliance can be generalized to the compliance with another set of rules for social interactions, namely the fairness norm, in Western cultures. Collectively, our data reveal contributions of a core cognitive process underlying social-distancing compliance during the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic, highlighting a potential cognitive venue for developing strategies to mitigate a public health crisis.

scholarly journals “I don’t feel safe sitting in my own yard”: Chicago resident experiences with urban rats during a COVID-19 stay-at-home order

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Maureen H. Murray ◽  
Kaylee A. Byers ◽  
Jacqueline Buckley ◽  
Seth B. Magle ◽  
Dorothy Maffei ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Health Risks ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Health Concern ◽  
Rodent Control ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
Social Distancing ◽  
Factors Associated ◽  
Apartment Buildings ◽  
At Home

Abstract Background Encounters with rats in urban areas increase risk of human exposure to rat-associated zoonotic pathogens and act as a stressor associated with psychological distress. The frequency and nature of human-rat encounters may be altered by social distancing policies to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic. For example, restaurant closures may reduce food availability for rats and promote rat activity in nearby residential areas, thus increasing public health risks during a period of public health crisis. In this study, we aimed to identify factors associated with increased perceived exposure to rats during a stay-at-home order, describe residents’ encounters with rats relevant to their health and well-being, and identify factors associated with increased use of rodent control. Methods Urban residents in Chicago, a large city with growing concerns about rats and health disparities, completed an online questionnaire including fixed response and open-ended questions during the spring 2020 stay-at-home order. Analyses included ordinal multivariate regression, spatial analysis, and thematic analysis for open-ended responses. Results Overall, 21% of respondents (n = 835) reported an increase in rat sightings around their homes during the stay-at-home order and increased rat sightings was positively associated with proximity to restaurants, low-rise apartment buildings, and rat feces in the home (p ≤ 0.01). Many respondents described feeling unsafe using their patio or yard, and afraid of rats entering their home or spreading disease. Greater engagement with rodent control was associated with property ownership, information about rat control, and areas with lower incomes (p ≤ 0.01). Conclusions More frequent rat encounters may be an unanticipated public health concern during periods of social distancing, especially in restaurant-dense areas or in low-rise apartment buildings. Rat presence may also limit residents’ ability to enjoy nearby outdoor spaces, which otherwise might buffer stress experienced during a stay-at-home order. Proactive rat control may be needed to mitigate rat-associated health risks during future stay-at-home orders.

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