COVID-19 information seeking and individuals' protective behaviors: examining the role of information sources and information content

Background Seeking COVID-19 information promotes individuals to adopt preventive behaviors, including wearing a mask, social distancing, staying away from risky places, and washing hands. This study aims to investigate which information and sources individuals relied on in seeking COVID-19 information and further examine their roles in individuals' adoption of preventive behaviors. Methods Through a statistical analysis of 1027 valid responses from citizens in different Chinese cities in 2022 to the self-designed items in an online survey, this study identified individuals' preferred information sources and content on COVID-19. Regarding the information sources and content, the study used multiple regression analysis to examine their associations with individuals' preventive behaviors, and further applied fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to explore their configurations that increase the likelihood of individuals adopting preventive behaviors. Results Individuals preferred information about the newest prevention and control policies, precautions and treatment, and symptoms from the sources of workplace and community, social media, and social live streaming services. Additionally, individuals' preventive behaviors were positively related to the workplace and community (beta = 0.202, p <.001), social live streaming services (beta = 0.089, p <.01), government department websites (beta = 0.079, p <.05), television (beta = 0.073, p <.05), and online news media (beta = 0.069, p <.05), but were negatively associated with newspapers (beta=-0.087, p <.05). Regarding information content, precautions and treatments (beta = 0.211, p <.001), the newest prevention and control policies (beta = 0.173, p <.001), symptoms (beta = 0.152, p <.001), and official rumor-dispelling information (beta = 0.082, p <.05) had a positive relationship with individuals' preventive behaviors. In addition, fsQCA results presented eight configurations that promote individuals to adopt preventive behaviors. The total coverage and solution consistency values were 0.869 and 0.987, respectively. Furthermore, COVID-19 information content, the sources of social media and interpersonal sources, and official news media played an essential role in increasing the likelihood of individuals adopting preventive behaviors. Conclusions Our findings demonstrated that individuals seek various COVID-19 information from multiple sources. The direct and degree of association of information sources and content with individuals' preventive behaviors vary from source to source and from content to content. Information sources and content could combinatorially promote individuals to adopt preventive behaviors through several configurations.