COVID-19 risk perceptions and precautions among the elderly: A study of CALD adults in South Australia

Abstract

Background: Coping with COVID-19 is a challenge for culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) older adults. In Australia, little attention has been given to understanding associations between cultural contexts, health promotion, and socio-emotional and mental health challenges of older CALD adults during the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, we have collected data from older CALD adults to examine their COVID-19 risk perceptions and its association with their health precautions, behavioural dimensions and emergency preparation. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted in South Australia. The CALD population aged 60 years and above were approached through 11 South Australian multicultural NGOs. Results: We provide the details of 155 older CALD South Australians’ demographics, risk perceptions, health precautions (problem-and-emotion-focused), behavioural dimensions and emergency preparation. The explanatory variables included demographic characteristics (age, gender, education and ethnicity); and risk perception (cognitive [likelihood of being affected] and affective dimension [fear and general concerns], and psychometric paradigm [severity, controllability, and personal impact]. The outcome measure variables were health precautions (problem-focused and emotion-focused), behavioral adaptions and emergency preparation. Conclusions: This dataset may help the researchers who investigate multicultural health or aged care in the pandemic and or who may have interest to link with other datasets and secondary use of this primary dataset in order to develop culturally tailored pandemic-related response plan. The data set is available from Harvard Dataverse.

Risk Perception and Health Precautions Towards COVID-19 Among Older Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Adults in South Australia: A Cross-Sectional Survey

“…As in other studies, fear was the most commonly cited factor in relation to emotional precaution. 47 , 48 , 61 , 62 Living in a multicultural country during the pandemic is a challenge, especially for the oldest group and females, who mostly rely on their family members and own community people for emotional care. Most people from CALD communities have lower socio-economic profile than the native Australia-born populations, with a lack of education, income, independence, and access to services.…”

The COVID-19 risk perceptions, health precautions, and emergency preparedness in older CALD adults in South Australia: A cross-sectional study

“…[ 26 ] This lack of compliance to emergency preparation in oldest CALD adults can be explained by either their experiences from previous pandemics, such as (H1N1) Influenza or reluctance because of health illiteracy. [ 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 ].…”

Older women’s experience with COVID-19 pandemic: A study of risk perception and coping among culturally and linguistically diverse population in South Australia

“…Empirical studies found that while the risk perception of getting infected by COVID-19 tended to decrease as age increases, perceived severity was higher among the older people [10]. Other evaluations showed the devastating effects of the COVID-19 on the mental health of older adults [11][12][13]. In short, recent studies revealed how COVID-19 compounded health contexts for older people, many of whom already suffered from physical and mental health issues.…”