Abstract
Introduction: Social capital, the effective functioning of social groups through networks of relationships, can affect mental health and may be affected by COVID-19. We aimed to examine the changes in social capital before and after the COVID-19 lockdown among the Chinese youth.Methods: A national convenience sample of 10,540 high school, undergraduate, and graduate students, from the COVID-19 Impact on Lifestyle Change Survey (COINLICS), reported their demographic and social capital information before and after the COVID-19 lockdown. Social capital was retrospectively measured at four levels: individual (ISC), family (FSC), community (CSC), and society (SSC). The changes of social capital were also compared across three educational levels.Results: Overall, ISC and CSC scores generally decreased after lockdown (15.1 to 14.8 and 13.4 to 13.1, respectively), while FSC and SSC scores increased significantly (12.7 to 13.0 and 7.1 to 7.2, respectively). At the individual level, most participants showed a constant perceived social capital; more of the remaining participants showed decreased than increased ISC (30.5% vs. 17.0%) and CSC scores (28.4% vs. 19.1%), while more participants showed increased than decreased FSC (21.7% vs. 9.2%) and SSC scores (10.3% vs. 3.9%). Heterogeneities in social capital changes existed across educational levels.Conclusions: Our findings would provide health professionals and policy-makers solid evidence on the changes in social capital of youths after lockdowns, and therefore help the design of future interventions to rebuild or improve their social capital after epidemics/disasters.
Highlights
Social capital, the effective functioning of social groups through networks of relationships, can affect mental health and may be affected by COVID-19
Measures taken by the government and relevant sectors to contain the COVID-19 pandemic have unprecedentedly attracted substantial social attention and possibly raised public trust, which could be reflected by the society social capital (SSC) [19]
Differences in the composition ratio of individual-level changes among educational levels were found in all dimensions of social capital. This is a retrospective study based on a national sample, which provided a picture of changed social capital among youths before and after the lockdown
Summary
The effective functioning of social groups through networks of relationships, can affect mental health and may be affected by COVID-19. Highlighted is the crucial role of social capital when a nation’s people face disasters or catastrophes [5]. Given its crucial roles, preventing the possibility of dramatic post-disaster decline in social capital deserves attention, especially for youths who are fairly dependent on society and family [7]. The youth might be more likely to show a significant change in social capital when facing disasters, which may directly or indirectly affect their mental health and vary by age and level of maturity (i.e., youths of different levels of maturity may perceive social capital differently) [8, 9]
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