'This bloody rona!': using the digital story completion method and thematic analysis to explore the mental health impacts of COVID-19 in Australia

Objective To use the digital story completion method to prompt participants to describe thoughts, fears and mental health experiences in response to a story stem about COVID-19, to capture a specific sociohistoric moment. Design We used digital story completion, a qualitative research method, to gather narratives from Australians coping with physical distancing and social restriction measures. Our reflexive thematic analysis of the data was underpinned by a constructionist approach to reflect the importance of social context in understanding health experiences. Setting Australia. Participants 52 people living in Australia (aged 18 years and over). Results Four meta-themes were prevalent across 52 stories submitted: (1) expressions of mental distress linked to COVID-19; (2) various coping strategies offered by characters in stories; (3) narratives outlining social support offered to alleviate distress; and (4) specialised COVID-19 vocabulary. Conclusion We cautiously propose that points of convergence across stories indicate a level of shared experience among participants relating to COVID-19 in Australia. We suggest this is due to intensive media coverage of the pandemic, persistent public health messaging, engagement with social media and instant messaging technologies, and extended lockdowns that impacted the mental health of vast numbers of Australians.