Factors associated with the perception of fear of COVID-19 in university students.

Camille Francine Modena,Moisés Kogien,Samira Reschetti Marcon,Frantielen Castor Dos Santos Nascimento,Marcos Vítor Naves Carrijo,Lauro Miranda Demenech

doi:10.1590/0034-7167-2021-0448

Camille Francine Modena, Moisés Kogien + Show 4 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1590/0034-7167-2021-0448

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Abstract

to analyze the factors associated with the perception of fear of COVID-19 in Brazilian university students. this is an online, cross-sectional analytical study conducted at a Brazilian public university with 1,437 undergraduate students between September and November 2020. The Fear of COVID-19 Scale was used to measure the main construct. Data analysis was performed using Mann-Whitney U test, Cohen's r test and multiple linear regression analysis. factors associated with fear of COVID-19 in university students were the variables biological sex, perception of good sleep quality, many days of access to information, not complying with social distancing, reporting sufficient hours of sleep, not having a partner, guidance sexual non-heterosexual, being in the risk group for COVID-19 and tobacco consumption. the study findings can contribute to the discussion about the weaknesses that the university population is experiencing in this pandemic period.

Highlights

METHODSAt the end of 2019, the first human cases of COVID-19 (Coronavirus Disease 2019), a disease caused by SARS-CoV-2 (Severe Acute Respiratory) were identified in the city of Wuhan, China
The sample of this study consisted of 1,437 students from different university campuses at the Universidade Federal do Mato Grosso (UFMT)
For the differences in the average fear scores of COVID-19 according to the social characteristics of the university students, there were significant differences in the average fear score according to biological sex, marital status and sexual orientation

Summary

Introduction

METHODSAt the end of 2019, the first human cases of COVID-19 (Coronavirus Disease 2019), a disease caused by SARS-CoV-2 (Severe Acute Respiratory) were identified in the city of Wuhan, China. The decree of the state of pandemic by COVID-19 brought a series of repercussions to people’s lives, drastically changing their daily lives and the way of relating to others and to the environment[4]. Such changes ended up having deleterious repercussions in various facets of human life, especially in individuals’ mental health[5], including university students, who had their activities interrupted or considerably modified, mainly due to the severity of the pandemic and the need to adopt measures of social distancing and isolation[6]

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