Poster #70 - Adolescents’ COVID-19 public health behaviour intentions: The role of misinformation source & potential harm

• In Event: Poster Session 04

Abstract

Adolescents are less at risk of developing severe symptoms when they contract COVID-19 but may still transmit the virus (Irfan et al., 2021). Understanding the factors that contribute to adolescents’ intentions to adhere to public health guidelines (e.g., social distancing) is an important step when considering the likelihood of future zoonotic pandemics. Recent research has demonstrated that adolescents perceive their peers to be less likely to adhere to COVID-19 public health guidelines than they themselves are (McGuire et al., 2022), with perceptions of others’ behaviour an important predictor of COVID-19 public health behaviours (Gibson et al., 2021). The present study examines two factors that may contribute to this belief. First, COVID-19 is less personally harmful to most adolescents, which may lead to beliefs that other adolescents would ignore such guidelines. Second, misinformation regarding COVID-19 is rife on social media platforms that adolescents frequent (Cinelli et al., 2020). The present study manipulates both the perceived harm of a new strain of COVID-19, as well as the source of misinformation (adult, peer) to understand the impact of such information on intentions to adhere to guidelines.

In the present study, participants were asked to imagine a new strain of COVID-19 called Omega. The likelihood of personal harm of Omega (harmful to adolescents or not) and misinformation (received from adult source or peer source) were manipulated. Participants (n = 203, Mage = 15.53, SD = 1.08, 71 girls) recruited from schools in the United Kingdom read about the Omega strain and then reported their personal intentions to engage in five public health behaviours (hand washing, social distancing, mask wearing, avoiding outdoor activities, avoiding indoor gatherings) as well as how they perceived their peers would intend to engage with these guidelines.

Results demonstrated an interaction between the likelihood of personal harm and source of misinformation when participants were asked about their peers’ intentions. Specifically, when participants were told adolescents were not at harm from the Omega strain and they received misinformation from an adult source, participants perceived that their peers would be less likely to engage in social distancing (F(1, 123) = 6.33, p = .01, ηp2 = .05), avoiding outdoor activities (F(1, 123) = 4.75, p = .03, ηp2 = .04), and avoiding indoor gatherings (F(1, 123) = 6.93, p = .01, ηp2 = .05).

These findings demonstrate the importance of both personal risk and misinformation source in contributing to adolescents’ perceptions of how their peers will behave. Crucially, misinformation from an adult source in a situation where adolescents are at less risk (a context similar to much of the COVID-19 pandemic) was related to perceptions that peers would be less likely to engage in COVID-19 preventative behaviours. This is important since perceived peer norms play a key role in predicting individuals’ own public health behaviours (Yu et al., 2021). Given this evidence, in future pandemics it will be essential to prepare youth to critically evaluate adult sources of misinformation when considering their own public health behaviours.

Authors

• Luke McGuire, University Of Exeter
  Presenting Author

• Aqsa Farooq, University Of Exeter

• Adam Rutland, University Of Exeter