Department of Clinical Research, M.D. Centro de Investigaciones Biomédicas Y Clínicas (CINBIOCLI), Hospital Regional Universitario José María Cabral Y Báez (HRUJMCB), Santiago, Dominican Republic.
M.D. Independent researcher, Miami, Florida, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2021 Mar 9;16(3):e0248160. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0248160. eCollection 2021.
Despite the vast scientific evidence obtained from the genomic sequencing of COVID-19, controversy regarding its origin has been created in the mass media. This could potentially have a long-term influence on the behavior among individuals, such as failure to comply with proposed social distancing measures, leading to a consequent rise in the morbidity and mortality rates from COVID-19 infection. Several studies have collected information about knowledge, attitudes, and practices regarding COVID-19; however, very little is known about the relationship of the perceptions of the individuals regarding the origin of the virus with the knowledge and perception about social distancing. This study aimed at ascertaining this relationship. For such purpose, a web-based cross-sectional study was conducted among a sample population from five provinces of the Dominican Republic from June to July of 2020. The data collection instrument exploited in the study was a self-designed questionnaire distributed throughout different social media platforms. A purposive sampling strategy was implemented and a total of 1195 respondents completed the questionnaire. The collected data was analyzed using SPSS. Descriptive statistics, stepwise multiple linear regression, and one-way multivariate analysis were implemented to test the hypotheses. The level of education was significantly associated (P = .017) with individuals' perception about the origin of COVID-19, whilst only age (P = .032) and education level (P < .001) statistically significantly predicted 'knowledge about social distancing'. Perception of COVID-19 origin was statistically significant associated (P = < .001) with the measures of the dependent variables (knowledge and perception on social distancing). The present study has established a possible link between the 'perception of COVID-19 origin' and 'the perception and knowledge about social distancing'.
尽管从 COVID-19 的基因组测序中获得了大量的科学证据，但大众媒体却对其起源产生了争议。这可能会对个人行为产生长期影响，例如不遵守拟议的社交距离措施，从而导致 COVID-19 感染的发病率和死亡率相应上升。有几项研究收集了有关 COVID-19 的知识、态度和实践方面的信息；然而，对于个体对病毒起源的看法与对社交距离的知识和看法之间的关系，我们知之甚少。本研究旨在确定这种关系。为此，我们于 2020 年 6 月至 7 月期间在多米尼加共和国五个省份的样本人群中进行了一项基于网络的横断面研究。本研究中使用的数据收集工具是一份自我设计的问卷，通过不同的社交媒体平台进行分发。我们实施了一种目的性抽样策略，共有 1195 名受访者完成了问卷。收集的数据使用 SPSS 进行分析。采用描述性统计、逐步多元线性回归和单向多元分析来检验假设。教育水平与个体对 COVID-19 起源的看法显著相关（P =.017），而只有年龄（P =.032）和教育水平（P <.001）才能统计上显著预测“对社交距离的了解”。对 COVID-19 起源的看法与因变量的衡量标准（对社交距离的看法和知识）显著相关（P = <.001）。本研究确立了“对 COVID-19 起源的看法”与“对社交距离的看法和知识”之间的可能联系。
