Contested solidarity and vulnerability in social media-based public responses to COVID-19 policies of mobility restrictions in Singapore: a qualitative analysis of temporal evolution

Abstract

Background Mobility restriction is the most effective measure to control the spread of infectious disease at its early stage, especially if a cure and vaccine are not available. When control of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) required strong precautionary measures, lockdowns were necessarily implemented in countries around the globe. Public health risk communication about the justification and scope of a lockdown was challenging as it involved a conflict between solidarity and individual liberty and a trade-off between various values across groups with different socioeconomic statuses. In the study, we examined public responses to the government-announced “circuit breaker” (a local term for lockdown) at four-time points in Singapore: (1) entry, (2) extension, (3) exit of lockdown ‘phase 1’ and (4) entry of lockdown ‘phase 2’. Methods We randomly collected 100 comments from the relevant articles on new organisations’ Facebook and Instagram pages and conducted preliminary coding. Later, additional random 20 comments were collected to check the data saturation. Content analysis was focused on identifying themes that emerged from the responses across the four-time points. Results At the entry, public support for the lockdown was prevalent; yet most responses were abstract with uncertainty. At six weeks of lockdown, initial public responses with uncertainty turned into salient narratives of their lived experiences and hardship with lockdown and unmasking of societal weaknesses caused by COVID-19. At the entry to phase 2, responses were centred on social-economic impact, disparity, and lockdown burnout with the contested notion of continuing solidarity. A temporal pattern was seen in the rationalisation of the lockdown experience from trust, anxiety, attribution of pandemic and lockdown, blaming of non-compliant behaviours, and confusion. Conclusions The findings indicated a temporal evolution of public responses from solidarity, attribution of the sustained pandemic, increasing ambiguity towards strong precautionary measures, concerns about economic hardship and mental well-being to worsened social vulnerability, where the government’s restrictive policies were questioned with anxiety and confusion. Public health risk communication in response to COVID-19 should be transparent and address health equity and social justice to enhance individual and collective responsibility in protecting the public from the pandemic.

Measurement of burnout during the prolonged pandemic in the Chinese zero-COVID context: COVID-19 burnout views scale

“…Other studies also revealed a positive effect of fear of COVID-19 on stress and a prolonged exposure to stress would result in burnout ( 56 – 58 ). In line with other studies, we found the expected positive associations of the COVID-19 BVS with the presence of chronic illnesses ( 50 ), support for “living with the COVID” policy, i.e., by reducing the social distancing measures ( 51 ). Congruent with the literature, we found expected negative association of COVID-19 with age ( 13 , 50 , 54 , 59 ), status of COVID-19 vaccination ( 53 ), and attitude toward “dynamic Zero COVID-19 strategy” ( 41 , 54 ).…”

“…Other construal-related scales, including age, presence of chronic illnesses, support for living with the COVID policy, status of COVID-19 vaccination, and attitude about dynamic Zero COVID-19 strategy were used to analyse the concurrent validity of the COVID-19 BVS. Based on the current research findings, we expected a positive relationship of COVID-19 BVS with (i) FCV-19S ( 49 ), (ii) presence of chronic illnesses ( 50 ), and (iii) support for living with the pandemic, i.e., by reducing the social distancing measures ( 51 ). Research shows that burnout level may influence people's inertia or inaction toward vaccination ( 52 ).…”

COVID-19 Burnout Subject to the Dynamic Zero-COVID Policy in Hong Kong: Development and Psychometric Evaluation of the COVID-19 Burnout Frequency Scale

“…Consistent with the literature on COVID-19, the results of the study show the positive association of the COVID-19 BFS with the Fear of COVID-19 Scale (r = 0.131, p < 0.001) [70,71], chronic illness condition (r = 0.090, p < 0.001) [73], the intention to adopt "living with COVID" policy (r = 0.292, p < 0.001) by reducing the quarantine and social distancing rules [72] and being against the "dynamic Zero COVID-19 strategy" (r = 0.340, p < 0.001). As reported in previous studies [71,[73][74][75]79], the results showed a negative association of the scale with COVID-19 vaccination status (r = −0.149, p < 0.001), "Have your family members or close friends ever been infected with COVID-19?"…”

“…Participants were invited to respond on a scale from "Strongly Disagree" to "Strongly Agree" on a 5-point Likert scale. With reference to the recent literature on COVID-19, we anticipated that the COVID-19 BFS is positively associated with Fear of COVID-19 [70,71], and support for "living with COVID" policy by reducing the quarantine and social distancing rules [72]. We also expected the COVID-19 BFS to be positively correlated with chronic illness conditions [73].…”

The relationships between trait anger, forgiveness, and subjective well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic: a moderated mediating model under lockdown situation

“…People who are stuck in pandemic burnout may lead to lower levels of motivation, feelings of helplessness, loneliness, hopelessness, depersonalization, and reduced personal achievement (Haktanir et al, 2022). Lau et al (2022) examined the psychometric properties of COVID-19 Burnout Views Scale (BVS) with a large Hong Kong sample and found the expected positive associations of COVID-19 BVS with the presence of chronic illnesses (Hayat et al, 2022), support for "living with the COVID" policy, i.e., by reducing the social distancing measures (Ligo et al, 2021).…”