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.
Highlights
In March 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) a global pandemic and suggested that the world actively respond to its spread [1]
This study explored 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
COVID-19 knowledge and risk perception were significantly associated with the full adoption of all three behaviors; this association significantly differed by the type of COVID-19 preventive behavior
Summary
In March 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) a global pandemic and suggested that the world actively respond to its spread [1]. In the earlier part of the pandemic, the sudden appearance and rapid worldwide spread of COVID-19 caused confusion and anxiety in various countries given the misinformation regarding unclear transmission routes, the transmission was fairly controlled and its method agreed upon to be humanto-human respiratory droplets or direct contact [4]. Non-pharmaceutical interventions are reportedly the most efficient strategy to block the spread of COVID-19 in the community while waiting to achieve herd immunity from vaccination [5,6]. The spread of COVID19 in East Asian countries, such as Korea and China, was mitigated through the active participation of citizens in non-pharmaceutical interventions, the infectious disease management policies differ from country to country [8]
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