Associations of COVID-19 Knowledge and Risk Perception with the Full Adoption of Preventive Behaviors in Seoul

Jina Choo, Sooyeon Park and Songwhi Noh
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Jina Choo: College of Nursing, Korea University, Seoul 02841, Korea
Sooyeon Park: College of Nursing, Korea University, Seoul 02841, Korea
Songwhi Noh: College of Nursing, Korea University, Seoul 02841, Korea

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 22, 1-14

Abstract: This study explores the levels of COVID-19 knowledge, risk perception, and preventive behavior practice in Seoul, to determine whether knowledge and risk perception are significantly associated with the full adoption of preventive behaviors, for the delivery of a customized public campaign to Seoul’s citizens. A total of 3000 Seoul residents participated in this study through an online questionnaire survey. They had a mean score of 84.6 for COVID-19 knowledge (range: 0–100 points) and 4.2 (range: 1–7 points) for risk perception. Of the participants, 33.4% practiced full adoption of all three preventive behaviors: hand hygiene, wearing a face mask, and social distancing; wearing a face mask was practiced the most (81.0%). Women significantly adopted these three preventive behaviors more often compared with men. Both COVID-19 knowledge and risk perception were found to be significantly associated with the full adoption of preventive behaviors; however, this association differed by the type of preventive behavior. This indicates that city-level information on the levels of COVID-19 knowledge, risk perception, and preventive behaviors should be clearly and periodically communicated among public officers and healthcare professionals to continually raise the public’s awareness of the full adoption of non-pharmaceutical preventive behaviors.

Keywords: COVID-19; emerging communicable disease; risk reduction behavior; community participation; prevention and control; Seoul (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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