Background An outbreak of 2019 novel coronavirus disease(COVID-19) could cause a severe respiratory illness, which may come from Spray or ordinary contact, then pose a great threat to life. Meanwhile, epidemic may trigger excessive stress and have a terrible impact on mental health even health behaviors, especially some special individuals. So this study paved the way for psychological interventions focused on specific groups during the COVID-19 epidemic. Methods An internet survey was conducted on 2,449 residents in 20 provinces including Chongqing, Sichuan and Gansu et al, in order to collect the data of Chinese residents' perceived stress, COVID-19 awareness and health behaviors. SAS9.4 was used to analyze the relationship between health behaviors and perceived stress, and logistic regression was used to explore the influencing factors of health risk stress. Results The residents' perceived stress score was 22.25±7.2(total score was 56), and the incidence of health risk stress was 39.89% (977/2449). As perceived stress increased, the frequency of health behaviors such as washing hands and wearing a mask decreased in turn. Age, cognition of susceptibility to COVID-19, life-threaten level, cognition of the importance of home isolation, and cognition of the difference between common cold and COVID-19 were related to the occurrence of health risk stress. Conclusions There was a negative correlation between residents' health behaviors and perceived stress during the COVID-19 outbreak. It is of great significance to improve the public's awareness of the COVID-19, to provide good social support and psychological intervention for people with health risk stress and to promote their health behaviors.