Gender Differences in the COVID-19 Pandemic Risk Perception, Psychology, and Behaviors of Spanish University Students

Since human beings have a long tradition of coexistence with pandemics, which may profoundly impact them, adopting preventive measures is crucial for humankind’s survival. This study explores the intention-based critical factors affecting the willingness of individuals to adopt pandemic prevention. To this end, a representative sample of 931 Pakistanis filled in an online questionnaire. However, only 828 questionnaires were found to be complete and valid for path modeling analysis. The core findings are as follows: Firstly, peer groups’ beliefs, self-efficacy, perceived risk, pandemic knowledge, ease of pandemic prevention adoption, and risk-averse behavior are revealed as driving forces of the individuals’ willingness to adopt pandemic prevention. Contrastingly, a lack of trust in political will and mythical attitude towards pandemics are uncovered as inhibitors. Nevertheless, moral values depict a neutral role. Secondly, the peer groups’ beliefs are highest ranked, followed by the lack of trust in political will and a mythical attitude towards pandemic prevention. Finally, moral values are determined as the lowest-ranked critical factor. Based on these results, the government should promote awareness campaigns on lethality and fatality of the pandemic at both centralized and decentralized levels to win people’s trust at the grass-roots level and overcome the mythical attitude of individuals at all societal levels. Besides, access to personal protective gears should be made feasible since an easier pandemic prevention adoption would increase the individuals’ willingness to adopt such preventative measures.

Section: Literature Review and Hypotheses Formulationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Intention-Based Critical Factors Affecting Willingness to Adopt Novel Coronavirus Prevention in Pakistan: Implications for Future Pandemics

Ahmad

Akhtar

Jabeen

et al. 2021

“…Importantly, some initial evidence shows that women are more psychologically affected by the COVID-19 pandemic than men. For example, women in Italy, Spain, and Turkey reported greater anxiety, depression, and acute stress than men [14][15][16][17]. In China, women (vs. men) in the hardest-hit areas (i.e., Hubei Province) during the COVID-19 outbreak reported higher posttraumatic stress symptoms [18].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Women Suffered More Emotional and Life Distress than Men during the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Role of Pathogen Disgust Sensitivity

Ding

Yang

et al. 2021

The outbreak of the COVID-19 has brought upon unprecedented challenges to nearly all people around the globe. Yet, people may differ in their risks of social, economic, and health well-being. In this research, we take a gender-difference approach to examine whether and why women suffered greater emotional and life distress than men at the early stage of the COVID-19 outbreak in China. Using a large nationwide Chinese sample, we found that compared to men, women reported higher levels of anxiety and fear, as well as greater life disturbance during the COVID-19 pandemic. Importantly, that women suffered more was partly explained by their higher level of pathogen disgust sensitivity. Our findings highlight the important consequences of gender differences in response to the threat of the COVID-19 pandemic and suggest that policymakers pay more attention to gender inequalities regarding COVID-19 responses.

“…Finally, the actual COVID-19 pandemic is a great contextual stressor [ 70 , 71 , 72 , 73 , 74 , 75 , 76 , 77 ] that could affect women abuse, then it would be interesting to analyze the impact of COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown in women abuse.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Women Facing Psychological Abuse: How Do They Respond to Maternal Identity Humiliation and Body Shaming?

Martínez–González

Pérez-Pedraza

Alfaro-Álvarez

et al. 2021

Self Cite

This research analyzes the decisions made by women facing simulated situations of psychological abuse. Seventy-three women (36.9 ± 13.6 years) who had been victims of domestic violence participated. The analysis was based on their coping strategies, early maladaptive schemes, and their decisions in response to vignettes describing the following domestic violence situations: humiliation to women’s maternal identity with children as witnesses and body shaming. We used Student’s t and Mann–Whitney tests to compare the results between groups. The participants presented some coping strategies (social support seeking, wishful thinking, and professional support seeking) and several early maladaptive schemes (emotional deprivation, defectiveness/shame, social isolation/alienation, failure to achieve, attachment, and subjugation) associated with their reactions facing a situation of humiliation with children as witnesses. When the humiliation was against the body image, their reactions were associated with some coping strategies (wishful thinking, professional support seeking, autonomy, negative auto-focus coping, and positive reappraisal) and one maladaptive scheme (defectiveness/shame). Women who reacted avoidantly showed higher social and professional support seeking but experienced higher indicators of discomfort and deterioration of self-esteem than those who opted for assertive decisions. The presence of children as witnesses seems to be a factor of stress in the configuration of coping strategies and maladaptive schemes in female victims of domestic violence. The evolution of early maladaptive schemes and coping strategies requires observation to avoid the risk of isolation and permanence in victimizing relationships.