Illness Perceptions of COVID-19 in Europe: Predictors, Impacts and Temporal Evolution

Abstract

Objective: Illness perceptions (IP) are important predictors of emotional and behavioral responses in many diseases. The current study aims to investigate the COVID-19-related IP throughout Europe. The specific goals are to understand the temporal development, identify predictors (within demographics and contact with COVID-19) and examine the impacts of IP on perceived stress and preventive behaviors.Methods: This was a time-series-cross-section study of 7,032 participants from 16 European countries using multilevel modeling from April to June 2020. IP were measured with the Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire. Temporal patterns were observed considering the date of participation and the date recoded to account the epidemiological evolution of each country. The outcomes considered were perceived stress and COVID-19 preventive behaviors.Results: There were significant trends, over time, for several IP, suggesting a small decrease in negativity in the perception of COVID-19 in the community. Age, gender, and education level related to some, but not all, IP. Considering the self-regulation model, perceptions consistently predicted general stress and were less consistently related to preventive behaviors. Country showed no effect in the predictive model, suggesting that national differences may have little relevance for IP, in this context.Conclusion: The present study provides a comprehensive picture of COVID-19 IP in Europe in an early stage of the pandemic. The results shed light on the process of IP formation with implications for health-related outcomes and their evolution.

Persistent somatic symptoms are key to individual illness perception at one year after COVID-19

“…According to the common-sense model of self regulation (CSM), a theoretical framework enabling understanding of how people cope with threats to their health, such illness perceptions are influenced by situational stimuli such as symptoms, health information and patient’s knowledge (17–19). The individual illness perception was shown to influence disease coping, adjustment to adverse life events or chronic conditions and compliance with prevention, treatment and rehabilitation (20,21), also in context of acute COVID-19 (22–24). Finally, severe illness perception including the emotional response, concerns and consequence components was found associated with anxiety, depression and stress both in the general population and in COVID-19 patients (25–28).…”

To Get Vaccinated, or Not to Get Vaccinated, That Is the Question: Illness Representations about COVID-19 and Perceptions about COVID-19 Vaccination as Predictors of COVID-19 Vaccination Willingness among Young Adults in The Netherlands

“…Particularly, perceptions of more severe consequences and possibilities for prevention, more concerns and worries about the illness, and a better understanding of the illness were positively related to the intention to and the actual engagement in preventive behaviors [ 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 , 43 ]. Neto and colleagues [ 44 ] investigated the associations of illness representations about COVID-19 with non-pharmacological preventive behaviors and found that more concerns about COVID-19 and more perceived personal control about COVID-19 were related to more social distancing, handwashing, and self-isolation.…”

Effects of COVID-19 on Multilingual Communication

“…The results of a large-scale study of IP addresses associated with COVID-19 across Europe have been published. The authors analyzed the temporal development, identified predictors (within demographics and contact with COVID-19), and examined the impacts of IP on perceived stress and preventive behaviors (Dias Neto et al, 2021).…”