Boo Hye In, Choi Yun-Kyeung
Department of Psychology, BK21 Education & Research Team for Disaster and Trauma Intervention Keimyung University Daegu Korea.
Health Sci Rep. 2023 Jan 9;6(1):e1039. doi: 10.1002/hsr2.1039. eCollection 2023 Jan.
During this COVID-19 pandemic, many people experience and share emotions such as fear, anxiety, sadness, anger, and disgust, which can be regarded as collective emotions. This study investigated the effects of scenario-based attribution for serious diseases on collective emotions and social stigma.
Participants were 297 healthy adults who met two conditions: (1) not having tested positive for COVID-19 (including their family members or close friends) and no experience of self-quarantine; and (2) not having been diagnosed with lung cancer, and not having family members or close friends diagnosed with it. Three hundred participants were recruited, through a company conducting online surveys. A total of 297 data sets were analyzed, excluding data supplied by three participants who might have responded unreliably to the filler question. Scenarios were recorded according to attribution type (internal vs. external) and disease (COVID-19 vs. lung cancer). A 2 × 2 factorial design was used, whereby participants were randomly assigned to one of four conditions.
The COVID-19 condition showed higher scores on the perceived risk and fear of the disease compared to the lung cancer one. The COVID-19/internal attribution condition showed the highest scores for fear and anger toward scenario characters, and the lung cancer/external attribution condition showed higher sympathy scores than other conditions. Although attribution to COVID-19 was not directly related to social stigma, it could evoke negative emotions toward infected people.
The findings suggest that attributions of serious diseases such as COVID-19 to infected persons can influence collective emotions and the level of social stigma associated with the disease. Attention to the collective emotions and stigma associated with disease is a key component for communities and countries to recover from and respond to its impacts.
在此次新冠疫情期间，许多人经历并分享着恐惧、焦虑、悲伤、愤怒和厌恶等情绪，这些情绪可被视为集体情绪。本研究调查了针对严重疾病的情景归因对集体情绪和社会污名的影响。
参与者为297名健康成年人，他们满足两个条件：（1）新冠病毒检测未呈阳性（包括其家庭成员或亲密朋友）且无自我隔离经历；（2）未被诊断患有肺癌，且家庭成员或亲密朋友未被诊断患有肺癌。通过一家进行在线调查的公司招募了300名参与者。共分析了297个数据集，排除了三名可能对填充问题回答不可靠的参与者提供的数据。根据归因类型（内部归因与外部归因）和疾病（新冠病毒与肺癌）记录情景。采用2×2析因设计，参与者被随机分配到四个条件之一。
与肺癌情景相比，新冠病毒情景在疾病感知风险和恐惧方面得分更高。新冠病毒/内部归因情景对情景角色的恐惧和愤怒得分最高，肺癌/外部归因情景的同情得分高于其他情景。虽然对新冠病毒的归因与社会污名没有直接关系，但它可能引发对感染者的负面情绪。
研究结果表明，将新冠病毒等严重疾病归因于感染者会影响集体情绪以及与该疾病相关的社会污名程度。关注与疾病相关的集体情绪和污名是社区和国家从疾病影响中恢复并应对其影响的关键因素。
