Evolution of the concerns, perceptions and attitudes of the Spanish population during the COVID-19 pandemic

Authors

  • María Falcón-Romero Departamento de Ciencias Sociosanitarias. Medicina Legal y Forense. Instituto Murciano de Investigación Biosanitaria (IMIB), Universidad de Murcia.
  • Carmen Rodriguez-Blázquez Centro Nacional de Epidemiologia, Instituto de Salud Carlos III y CIBERNED https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3829-0675
  • María Romay-Barja Centro Nacional de Medicina Tropical, Instituto de Salud Carlos III y CIBERINFEC
  • Maria João Forjaz Centro Nacional de Epidemiologia, Instituto de Salud Carlos III, REDISSEC y RICAPPS

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.22325/fes/res.2023.162

Keywords:

COVID-19, risk perception, attitudes, surveys, COSMO-Spain

Abstract

Both individual and population behavior are determining factors in controlling the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the restrictions have impacted the mental and physical well-being of citizens, the social cohesion, the economic stability, as well as the community resilience. In this complex scenario, understanding the feelings and attitudes of the population helps us to identify their needs and adopt response measures to control the pandemic in a more consensual and effective way. The COSMO-Spain study explores the concerns, perceptions, and attitudes of the population about the pandemic to find out the acceptance and adherence to behavioral prevention measures, as well as to analyze the citizens’ risk perception, well-being and trust in information sources and institutions. The COSMO-Spain study has been carried out every two months since July 2020, through an online questionnaire to representative cross-sectional samples of the Spanish population, composed by 1000 people each. The results up to December 2021 show that the attitudes of the population are dynamic and evolve over time, influenced not only by individual factors, but also by contextual ones.

References

Aschwanden, D., Strickhouser, J. E., Sesker, A. A., Lee, J. H., Luchetti, M., Terracciano, A., & Sutin, A. R. (2021). Preventive Behaviors During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Associations With Perceived Behavioral Control, Attitudes, and Subjective Norm. Frontiers in Public Health, 9, 662835. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2021.662835

Beca-Martínez, M. T., Romay-Barja, M., Falcón-Romero, M., Rodríguez-Blázquez, C., Benito-Llanes, A., & Forjaz, M. J. (2021). Compliance with the main preventive measures of COVID-19 in Spain: The role of knowledge, attitudes, practices, and risk perception. Transboundary and Emerging Diseases, 69(4), e871-e882. https://doi.org/10.1111/tbed.14364

Betsch, C., Wieler, L. H., Habersaat, K., & COSMO group. (2020). Monitoring behavioural insights related to COVID-19. Lancet, 395(10232), 1255-1256. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30729-7

Bruine de Bruin, W., & Bennett, D. (2020). Relationships Between Initial COVID-19 Risk Perceptions and Protective Health Behaviors: A National Survey. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 59(2), 157-167. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amepre.2020.05.001

Chambon, M., Dalege, J., Elberse, J. E., & van Harreveld, F. (2022). A Psychological Network Approach to Attitudes and Preventive Behaviors During Pandemics: A COVID-19 Study in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 13(1), 233-245. https://doi.org/10.1177/19485506211002420

Consejo interterritorial del Sistema Nacional de Salud. (2020). Recomendaciones sobre estrategias comunicativas frente a la fatiga pandémica. (actualizadas a 3 de febrero de 2021). https://www.sanidad.gob.es/profesionales/saludPublica/ccayes/alertasActual/nCov/documentos/Recomendaciones_estrategias_comunicacion_fatiga_pandemica.pdf

Dryhurst, S., Schneider, C. R., Kerr, J., Freeman, A. L. J., Recchia, G., van der Bles, A. M., Spiegelhalter, D., & van der Linden, S. (2020). Risk perceptions of COVID-19 around the world. Journal of Risk Research, 23(7-8), 994-1006. https://doi.org/10.1080/13669877.2020.1758193

Gamboa Moreno, E., Garitano Gutiérrez, I., Portuondo Jiménez, J., Cabrera Rodríguez, A., Aldeguer Corbi, J., Tapia Alonso, N., Arrospide, A., & Picón Santamaría, A. (2021). Baja transmisión del SARS-CoV-2 en el ámbito escolar: Estudio poblacional en Euskadi. Revista Española De Salud Pública, 95, e202112196.

Instituto de Salud Carlos III. (2020). COSMO-Spain. Monitorización del comportamiento y las actitudes de la población relacionadas con la COVID-19 en España (COSMO-SPAIN). https://portalcne.isciii.es/cosmo-spain/

Liao, M., Liu, H., Wang, X., Hu, X., Huang, Y., Liu, X., Brenan, K., Mecha, J., Nirmalan, M., & Lu, J. R. (2021). A technical review of face mask wearing in preventing respiratory COVID-19 transmission. Current Opinion in Colloid & Interface Science, 52, 101417. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cocis.2021.101417

Mboya, I. B., Ngocho, J. S., Mgongo, M., Samu, L. P., Pyuza, J. J., Amour, C., Mahande, M. J., Leyaro, B. J., George, J. M., Philemon, R. N., Muro, F., Renju, J., & Msuya, S. E. (2020). Community engagement in COVID-19 prevention: experiences from Kilimanjaro region, Northern Tanzania. The Pan African medical journal, 35(Suppl 2), 146. https://doi.org/10.11604/pamj.supp.2020.35.146.24473

Moran, C., Campbell, D. J. T., Campbell, T. S., Roach, P., Bourassa, L., Collins, Z., Stasiewicz, M., & McLane, P. (2021). Predictors of attitudes and adherence to COVID-19 public health guidelines in Western countries: A rapid review of the emerging literature. Journal of Public Health (Oxford, England), 43(4), 739-753. https://doi.org/10.1093/pubmed/fdab070

Oltra, C., y Boso, À. (2020). Lecciones aprendidas de la crisis del coronavirus: Preparación y resiliencia social. Revista Española de Sociología, 29(3), 769-775. https://doi.org/10.22325/fes/res.2020.50

Perlstein, S. G., & Verboord, M. (2021). Lockdowns, lethality, and laissez-faire politics. Public discourses on political authorities in high-trust countries during the COVID-19 pandemic. PLOS ONE, 16(6), e0253175. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0253175

Sailer, M., Stadler, M., Botes, E., Fischer, F., & Greiff, S. (2022). Science knowledge and trust in medicine affect individuals’ behavior in pandemic crises. European Journal of Psychology of Education, 37(1), 279-292. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10212-021-00529-1

Salmon, D. A., Dudley, M. Z., Glanz, J. M., & Omer, S. B. (2015). Vaccine hesitancy: Causes, consequences, and a call to action. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 49(6), S391-S398. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amepre.2015.06.009

Santos, J. V., Gomes da Costa, J., Costa, E., Almeida, S., Cima, J., & Pita-Barros, P. (2022). Factors associated with non-pharmaceutical interventions compliance during COVID-19 pandemic: A Portuguese cross-sectional survey. Journal of Public Health (Oxford, England), fdac001. https://doi.org/10.1093/pubmed/fdac001

van den Broek-Altenburg, E., & Atherly, A. (2021). Adherence to COVID-19 policy measures: Behavioral insights from The Netherlands and Belgium. PloS One, 16(5), e0250302. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0250302

Wang, J., Guo, C., Wu, X., & Li, P. (2022). Influencing factors for public risk perception of COVID-19——Perspective of the pandemic whole life cycle. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 67, 102693. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2021.102693

World Health Organization. (2020). Survey tool and guidance: Rapid, simple, flexible behavioural insights on COVID-19. https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/333549

YouGov. (2020). COVID-19: Level of support for actions governments could take. https://yougov.co.uk/topics/international/articles-reports/2020/03/17/level-support-actions-governments-could-take

Yuan, H., Long, Q., Huang, G., Huang, L., & Luo, S. (2022). Different roles of interpersonal trust and institutional trust in COVID-19 pandemic control. Social Science & Medicine, 293, 114677. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2021.114677

Zafra, I. (2021, febrero 11). Infected individuals in schools only pass coronavirus on to an average of 0.4 people, Catalan government finds. El País. https://english.elpais.com/spanish_news/2021-02-11/infected-individuals-in-schools-only-pass-coronavirus-on-to-an-average-of-04-people-catalan-regional-government-finds.html

Downloads

Published

2023-03-24

How to Cite

Falcón-Romero, M., Rodriguez-Blázquez, C., Romay-Barja, M., & Forjaz, M. J. (2023). Evolution of the concerns, perceptions and attitudes of the Spanish population during the COVID-19 pandemic. Spanish Journal of Sociology, 32(2), a162. https://doi.org/10.22325/fes/res.2023.162

Issue

Vol. 32 No. 2 (2023): Miscellaneous articles, a special issue on cultural diversity and education, and a controversy about attitudes towards the pandemic

Section

Debates

License

Copyright (c) 2023 María Falcón-Romero, Carmen Rodriguez-Blázquez, María Romay-Barja, Maria João Forjaz

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

In the event that your manuscript is accepted for publication in Revista Española de Sociología, it will be understood that the authors access to:

• The transfer of the copyright of the article to Revista Española de Sociología.

• The assignment to the Revista Española de Sociología of the rights of commercial exploitation of the article to third parties both in the offset and digital formats, as well as to the search engines and platforms that may serve as intermediaries for the sale or knowledge of the article.