The influence of COVID on Chinese younger and older adults' attitudes toward the US and the factors that can affect their attitudes and negative emotions

Abstract

This study aims to analyze the influence of COVID on Chinese adults’ attitudes toward the US and examine factors that can affect their attitudes. A total number of 288 Chinese adults were selected as the investigation objects, and 282 effective questionnaires were collected with a recovery rate of 97.81% (134 effective questionnaires of younger adults) and 98.01% (148 effective questionnaires of older adults). The general demographic of the adults were collected, including 130 men and 158 women, with an age range of 19-50 years (younger adults: 19-30, mean age 24.69, standard deviation 3.34; older adults: 31-50, mean age: 39.09, standard deviation: 5.21). Questions included in the questionnaire were introduced explicitly in the material section. The study found that responsibility, attitudes toward the US after COVID, and negative emotion they have experienced during COVID is closely correlated with each other and other parts of this study, which can indicate that for younger and older adults, COVID had greatly influenced their perspective on the US. Regression analysis revealed that (1) for both younger and older adults, factors like general bias, browsing or searching for keywords related to COVID and its origin, and unintentionally spreading rumors about the US can be the significant factors that affect their attitudes; (2) for older adults, factors like searching or browsing for keywords related to COVID and attitude toward the US after COVID affect negative emotions they have experienced during COVID.