Abstract
BackgroundThe only previous studies that formulated a theoretical model of epidemics for psychological response relative to cultural perspectives have focused on the role of individualism–collectivism and have omitted analysis of tightness–looseness. This study explored the role of cultural tightness in relation to psychological disorders during the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.MethodsWe recruited 1827 Chinese adolescents (Mage = 18.16 ± 2.23 years, 53.3% female) to participate a cross-sectional survey. Participants completed a series of questionnaires, including the scales of cultural tightness, risk perception of COVID-19 pandemic, perceived protection efficacy, anxiety and depression. A latent moderated structural equations model was used to analyse the mediating and moderating effects of risk perception regarding COVID-19, cultural tightness and perceived protection efficacy on psychological disorders.ResultsThe results showed that greater risk perception of COVID-19 predicted greater psychological disorders, however cultural tightness moderated this positive relationship. The increase in psychological disorders with risk perception regarding COVID-19 was less pronounced among people who lived in tighter cultural areas. In addition, this moderating effect of cultural tightness was further mediated by perceived protection efficacy; that is, tight culture protects against psychological disorders by enhancing perceived protection efficacy.ConclusionThis study enriched the theoretical framework of cultural tightness and indicated its importance in the field of mental health and health policies. It also emphasized the importance of tight culture as a protective factor against psychological disorders in case of COVID-19 outbreaks, providing valuable practical insight into psychological prevention for COVID-19 outbreaks.
Highlights
The only previous studies that formulated a theoretical model of epidemics for psychological response relative to cultural perspectives have focused on the role of individualism–collectivism and have omitted analysis of tightness–looseness
The results of correlation analyses indicated that associations among psychological disorders and risk perceptions of COVID-19 were positive (r = 0.27 ~ 0.28) and with cultural tightness and perceived protection efficacy were negative (r = − 0.05 ~ − 0.24)
The results showed that Model 0 had good fit (χ2/df = 3.55, comparative fit index (CFI) = 0.97, Tucker–Lewis index (TLI) = 0.96, root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) = 0.04 (0.03–0.04), standardized root mean residual (SRMR) = 0.03)
Summary
The only previous studies that formulated a theoretical model of epidemics for psychological response relative to cultural perspectives have focused on the role of individualism–collectivism and have omitted analysis of tightness–looseness. COVID-19, which was declared in January 2020 to be a public health emergency of international concern by WHO [1] has major impacts all over the world [2]. Fear of this overwhelming infectious disease has caused distress that is an unprecedented threat to psychological coping, leading to clinical and sub-clinical disorders, such as anxiety and depressive symptoms [2,3,4]. Not all people with high risk perception develop psychological disorders during a crisis event, because socio-cultural and psychological factors mutually affect psychological disorders [10]. Previous studies regarding the cultural factors mainly focused on the perspective of individualismcollectivism [10], while ignoring other dimensions of cultures, for instance, the cultural tightness-looseness
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