Measuring the impact of message format about handwashing on behavioural intentions in the first weeks of COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic was an unprecedented threat to global health. During times of public health crises, governments and healthcare practitioners must effectively communicate preventive guidelines to the public to reduce viral transmission. Public compliance with recommended health behaviours is essential to the success of the overall pandemic response. This online experiment investigated the persuasiveness of visual message format on COVID-19 handwashing guidelines on people's behavioural intentions. A total of 350 participants, recruited through Amazon's MTurk, were randomly assigned to one of three information format conditions: text, infographic, or video. Results indicated that perceived severity, benefits, self-efficacy, cues to action, and perceived barriers significantly predicted people's intentions to comply with suggested preventive guidelines. There were no significant differences between the three information formats, in terms of behavioural intentions. These results have consequences for identifying and implementing public health strategies for a global health crisis such as the COVID-19 pandemic to achieve higher citizen engagement, and for understanding future emerging infectious disease preparedness.

Social Distancing during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Switzerland: Health Protective Behavior in the Context of Communication and Perceptions of Efficacy, Norms, and Threat

The success of health protection measures depends on public compliance. This paper aims to understand the influence of three different types of communication (i.e., news media, social media, and interpersonal communication) on people's engagement in health protective behavior during a public health crisis. Our C-ENT model of health protective behavior proposes that communication raises perceptions of efficacy, norms, and threat, which in turn influence health protective behavior (communication → efficacy, norms, threat: C-ENT). We test the model for the case of social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic, based on a representative online survey during the first week of the lockdown in Switzerland (N = 1005). The results support the C-ENT model and illustrate the important role of communication engagement during a public health crisis. News media use was associated with perceptions of behavior-related efficacy and norms and disease-related threat, and these perceptions were positively associated with compliance with social distancing. Social media use and interpersonal communication were related with perceived norms. Social media use was negatively and interpersonal communication positively associated with health behavior-supporting normative perceptions. Our findings suggest taking the distinct pattern among communication types (i.e., news media, social media, and interpersonal communication), perceptions, and behavior into account in order to understand existing dependencies and design respective communication strategies.

Profile identification and characterization of risk perceptions and preventive behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic: A latent profile analysis

In a public health crisis, communication plays a vital role in making sure policies and recommendations from the government level get disseminated accurately to its people and is only considered as effective when the public accepts, supports, complies to, and engages in policies or behaves as per governments' recommendations. Adopting the multivariate audience segmentation strategy for health communication, this study uses a data-driven analytical method to (1) identify audience segments of public health crisis communication in Singapore based on knowledge, risk perception, emotional responses, and preventive behaviors; and (2) characterize each audience segment according to demographic factors, personality traits, information processing styles, and health information preferences. Results (N = 2033) from a web-based questionnaire executed in August 2021 have identified three audience segments: the less-concerned (n = 650), the risk-anxious (n = 142), and the risk-majority (n = 1,241). This study offers insights to how audiences of public health crisis communication perceive, process, and respond to information directed to them during the pandemic, thereby informing policy makers to tailor more targeted public health communication interventions in promoting positive attitude and behavior change.

Impact of COVID-19 on search in an organisation

COVID-19 has created unprecedented organisational challenges, yet no study has examined the impact on information search. A case study in a knowledge-intensive organisation was undertaken on 2.5 million search queries during the pandemic. A surge of unique users and COVID-19 search queries in March 2020 may equate to 'peak uncertainty and activity', demonstrating the importance of corporate search engines in times of crisis. Search volumes dropped 24% after lockdowns; an 'L-shaped' recovery may be a surrogate for business activity. COVID-19 search queries transitioned from awareness, to impact, strategy, response and ways of working that may influence future search design. Low click through rates imply some information needs were not met and searches on mental health increased. In extreme situations (i.e. a pandemic), companies may need to move faster, monitoring and exploiting their enterprise search logs in real time as these reflect uncertainty and anxiety that may exist in the enterprise.

Predicting Information Behaviors in the COVID-19 Pandemic: Integrating the Role of Emotions and Subjective Norms into the Situational Theory of Problem Solving (STOPS) Framework

This study examined individuals' information behaviors in the COVID-19 pandemic. It applied the situational theory of problem solving (STOPS) and integrated the role of two negative emotions (i.e., fear and anger) and subjective norms into the framework. A survey of 627 South Korean adults was conducted in March 2020, when the country experienced an early but rapidly accelerating pandemic stage. The results of structural equation modeling demonstrated that in addition to confirming the major propositions of STOPS, three situational perception variables (i.e., problem recognition, involvement recognition, and constraint recognition) were highly associated with an individual's fear and anger regarding the COVID-19 outbreak. However, only fear significantly affected situational motivation in problem-solving and information behaviors (i.e., information-seeking, forwarding, and permitting). The study discusses the theoretical and practical implications of the findings.

Modeling the formation of the public's information needs in the early stage of the COVID-19 outbreak

Purpose

This study aims to investigate how the public formed their need for information in the early stage of the COVID-19 outbreak. Exploring the formation of information needs can reveal why the public's information needs differ and provide insights on targeted information service during health crises at an essential level.

Design/methodology/approach

The data were collected through semi-structured interviews with 46 participants and analyzed using the grounded theory approach. Concepts, sub-categories and categories were developed, and a model was built to examine how the public formed the need for information about the pandemic.

Findings

The authors found that participants were stimulated by information asymmetry, severity of the pandemic and regulations to control the pandemic, which triggered their perceptions of information credibility, threat and social approval. After the participants perceived that there was a threat, it activated their basic needs and they actively formed the need for information based on cognitive activities. Moreover, information delivered by different senders resulted in a passive need for information. Participants' individual traits also influenced their perceptions after being stimulated.

Research limitations/implications

Long-term follow-up research is needed to help researchers identify more detailed perspectives and do comparative studies. Besides, this study conducted interviews through WeChat voice calls and telephone calls, and might be limited compared with face-to-face interviews.

Practical implications

The findings of this study provide theoretical contributions to the information needs research and practical implications for information services and public health management.

Originality/value

There is little systematic research on how the public formed information needs in the early stage of the COVID-19 outbreak.

What difficulties did the college students encountered in information seeking during the COVID-19 pandemic?

To better promote information service and fight the infodemic, this paper investigated the difficulties that Chinese college students encountered in information seeking during the COVID-19 pandemic. We collected data in two stages. In the first stage in November 2020, we collected data from the Foundation of Information Science course. 54 college students who took the course completed an assignment to illustrate their information needs and difficulties during the pandemic. In the second stage in March 2021, trough convenience sampling we conducted an online survey by WenJuanXing. The participants were required to answer the same question as the question in the first stage. We collected 204 valid responses. Then, based on the search task difficulty reason scheme proposed by Liu et al. (2015) (denoted LKC15), we used content analysis to code the responses to analyze the difficulties that Chinese students encountered. LKC15's difficulty reasons were classified from three aspects: user, task, and user-task interaction. The findings indicated that 14 of the 21 difficulty reasons in LKC15 were identified in this study. Moreover, we added 17 new Difficulty reasons to revise the scheme. The difficulty reasons of user-task interaction were mentioned most frequently. In terms of user-task interaction, the difficulty reasons related to document features were mentioned most frequently, followed by the search results. Finally, it provided some suggestions and discussed the directions for future study.

(Mis)Information, Fears and Preventative Health Behaviours Related to COVID-19

Social and mass media platforms (SMM) are essential tools for keeping people informed about health-promoting practices. However, the potential to spread misinformation or false rumors exists. These might influence preventive health behaviours and incite anxiety and/or fear among the population. A sample of 300 adults participated in a survey to understand information needs, fears and preventive health behaviours related to COVID-19 while analyzing differences in COVID-19 acceptance rates. Descriptive-correlational, between-group comparisons and regression analyses were applied. Most of the sample revealed a willingness to accept COVID-19 vaccines (65.4% vs. 34.5%) and was prone to use and trust different SMM without experiencing significant obstacles in managing COVID-19-related information except for the need to ration it from time to time (χ2(2, N = 298) = 6.654, p = 0.036). Preventive behaviours/measures carried out were similar among the people resistant, hesitant or willing to get vaccinated for COVID-19. However, higher self-efficacy was observed in resistant vaccine individuals (F(2) = 3.163, p = 0.044). Psychological impact (need for psychological support due to COVID-19 situation) in accepting (F(5, 189) = 17.539, p < 0.001, R2 = 0.317) and hesitant individuals (F(5, 77) = 17.080, p < 0.001, R2 = 0.526) was explained by female gender, younger age, threat susceptibility and differential characteristics in terms of psychological symptoms experienced and SMM trust. No explanatory model was obtained for the resistant individuals. SMM could be effective tools to promote COVID-19 health preventive behaviours. However, psychographic characteristics might modulate information-seeking and management as well as self-perceived threat susceptibility and severity. All these factors must be accurately considered when designing different health preventive campaigns for the general public.

Information needs and seeking behaviors of Israeli citizens during the COVID-19 outbreak

Purpose

The aim of this study is to examine the information needs and information seeking behaviors of Israeli citizens during the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in 2020, with an emphasis on the dissemination of digital information by government agencies.

Design/methodology/approach

The research approach underlying this investigation is of the “case study” type, employing semi-structured, in-depth interviews conducted with 24 Israeli citizens regarding their perceptions and experiences with government information and government services during the first months of the coronavirus.

Findings

The findings of this study reveal that most participants indicated feelings of media fatigue as a result of increased exposure to news media and social media, to the point of experiencing information overload. Second, participants described feeling a lack of clear information and poor access to accurate health and official information at the outset of the COVID-19 crisis in Israel. Third, participants in the authors’ study noted that most of the information to which they were exposed about the virus came to them through communal connections such as friends and family, via social media and messaging apps like WhatsApp. In general, the participants expressed satisfaction with the quality and availability of the data and extensive information of government ministries on social networks, together with a lack of satisfaction due to difficulties in usage and a lack of clear information on traditional government websites.

Originality/value

The findings present the information acquisition and the experience of citizens in situations of national emergencies and crises, in a new light, through a focus on the dissemination of government, health and news information.

Exploring information seeking of rural older adults during the COVID-19 pandemic

Purpose

This study investigates the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the types and sources of information sought by older adults along with their motivations in the Midwestern United States.

Design/methodology/approach

Interviews were conducted with 30 older adults residing in rural communities around the Midwestern United States during late-summer (July/August) 2020, using a protocol based on Dervin's Sense-Making Methodology. The resulting data was analyzed using standard content analysis procedures, guided by the theoretical frameworks based on Dervin's Sense-Making and Williamson's Ecological Model of Information Behavior. Implications of COVID-19 for the normative behaviors described in these models are discussed.

Findings

Findings show that older adults were concerned primarily with health and political information during this period, but that this information was not necessarily sought only to address an informational need, but also to satisfy the need to maintain social and emotional connections in coping with isolation and loneliness. Sources of information that allowed for social interaction with people were favored. Wider personal networks (community members) were strained by the social distancing measures and closures. These findings have theoretical and practical implications for considering the impact of social restrictions on information seeking behaviors of older adults in a time of crisis.

Originality/value

This study is the first, known to the authors, that applied the two adopted theoretical frameworks to explore information seeking behaviors of older adults during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Arab women feelings while seeking information during COVID-19 pandemic: applying PMT constructs

Purpose

This study investigates the effect of protection motivation theory (PMT) constructs on Arab women's feelings while seeking information during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Design/methodology/approach

The study has adopted a mixed-method approach using semi-structured interviews and a questionnaire to explore PMT constructs' impact on women's feelings while seeking information on COVID-19. Several tests, such as standard deviation, mean, skewness, kurtosis and persons, were used to check the reliability of data and inter-relationships between constructs.

Findings

The study results show a significant positive correlation between PMT constructs (perceived vulnerability, perceived severity, response efficacy, self-efficacy and response cost) with the feelings of Arab women during information seeking on COVID-19. However, the relationship between threat appraisal and feelings during information seeking was more substantial than coping appraisal and feelings during information seeking. The researchers hope that this study creates a baseline of cross-cultural studies on PMT constructs' effect on women's feelings while seeking health information.

Research limitations/implications

The current study was conducted on female participants only. While the study intended to examine Arab women's feelings during information seeking with PMT's application, the results may be affected by other factors that were not considered in the current study. Furthermore, the questionnaire was distributed in three Arab countries, which means that the results cannot be generalized in other geographical contexts. Therefore, similar studies need to be conducted in larger geographical areas as cultural factors may produce different results.

Originality/value

This study explores women's feelings while seeking COVID-19 information using the PMT constructs. As far as we know, this study is the first study to investigate Arab women's feelings while seeking health information during pandemics. PMT utilization is considered a new approach to discover and measure informational needs and feelings associated with it during pandemics.

A study of Chinese college students' COVID-19-related information needs and seeking behavior

Purpose

To better meet people's information needs under the public health crisis, this study explored the information needs and seeking behavior of college students in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Design/methodology/approach

This research utilized a survey and the convenience snowball sampling method. A sample of 400 college students was obtained.

Findings

The results revealed that college students have paid great attention to COVID-19-related information. They sought the information mainly for personal protection, obtaining the latest information and seeking information for family and friends. Their COVID-19-related information needs were diverse; at different stages, the concerns were different. Social media and mass media were both found to be the most useful tools for seeking COVID-19 information. Too much repetitive information, unclear authoritative and reliable informational sources, and difficulties in judging the authenticity of the information were the most common obstacles for them in information seeking. Nevertheless, the majority of the students agreed that they were very satisfied and somewhat satisfied with the current information services. This did not affect the students' understanding of the importance of health services provided by libraries.

Originality/value

Insights into the people's information needs and information-seeking behavior of this study could help the information providers to offer appropriate information in better ways to improve the public's virus protection capabilities and maintain the stability of social order.

The information-seeking behavior and levels of knowledge, precaution, and fear of college students in Iloilo, Philippines amidst the COVID-19 pandemic

COVID-19 pandemic is devastating the health, social, and economic well-being of citizens worldwide. The high rates of morbidity and mortality and the absence of vaccines cause fear among the people regardless of age, gender, or social status. People's fear is heightened by misinformation spread across all media types, especially on social media. Filipino college students are one of the top Internet users worldwide and are very active in social media. Hence they are very prone to misinformation. This paper aims to ascertain the levels of knowledge, precaution, and fear of COVID-19 of the college students in Iloilo, Philippines, and determine the effects of their information-seeking behavior on the variables above. This paper is a cross-sectional survey that used a qualitative-quantitative method and snowball sampling technique. Data were gathered among 228 college students using an online survey instrument a few months after the pandemic began. College students were knowledgeable of the basic facts about the highly infectious COVID-19. However, the majority were inclined to believe the myths and misinformation regarding the pandemic. Television was the primary, most believable, and preferred source when seeking information. The Internet as a preferred source of information was significantly associated with a high level of knowledge. In contrast, the information sourced from interpersonal channels were found to make college students very cautious. The local presence of COVID-19 cases had caused college students to fear, likely exacerbated by the plethora of information about the pandemic, mostly from Facebook. This is the first study conducted on the effects of the information-seeking behavior on the levels of knowledge, precaution, and fear of COVID-19 of the college students in Iloilo, Philippines.

Public sentiments towards the use of Wolbachia-Aedes technology in Singapore

Background

Wolbachia technology is a novel vector control approach that can reduce mosquito populations and the risk of mosquito-borne diseases, which has recently gained popularity amongst countries. In 2016, Singapore embarked on a multi-phased field study named Project Wolbachia – Singapore, to evaluate the use of Wolbachia technology as an Aedes aegypti mosquito population suppression tool to fight dengue. Due to the novelty of this technology in Singapore, this study aims to understand the public’s acceptance and sentiments towards the use of Wolbachia technology.

Methods

Several public sentiment survey approaches – including online, face-to-face in the streets, as well as door-to-door household surveys – were conducted.

Results

The surveys conducted prior to the first field releases and implementation of the project revealed high support for the use of Wolbachia technology in Singapore. A household perception survey conducted in the interim of the first project phase was encouraging, with the majority of the respondents being aware of the project and having no concerns with the release of male Wolbachia-carrying Aedes aegypti (Wolbachia-Aedes) mosquitoes in their neighbourhood.

Conclusions

The study reveal high support for the use of Wolbachia technology in Singapore and also provided invaluable insights that were used in the development of a public communications and engagement framework model, which thus helped to guide these elements in the subsequent phases and expansion of the project.

Documenting contemporary regional history: the Utah COVID-19 digital collection

Purpose

When faced with events, such as the global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), libraries have a unique opportunity to develop a community facing response through born-digital collections. These collections provide challenges for metadata creation, collection development policies, workflows, and digital preservation. This paper aims to provide an overview of the Utah COVID-19 digital collection, with a discussion of impact and lessons learned.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper provides a case study of a born-digital collection initiative undertaken at the University of Utah in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The project prompted engagement with the University of Utah communities and people across the state. Workflows, metadata management and partnerships are discussed, to provide a model for institutions developing similar projects during a time of crisis.

Findings

While the project was launched with open-ended and flexible goals, the response from the community has been both surprising and gratifying. Statistics and examples demonstrating reuse of collection materials are provided to highlight the impact and potential of community engagement.

Originality/value

Digital collecting projects during a historical event are not new, however the restrictions placed upon people worldwide during the COVID-19 pandemic created interesting circumstances for building this collection. Several lessons were learned throughout the project which will be useful for other institutions embarking upon related projects.