Population anxiety and positive behaviour change during the COVID-19 epidemic: Cross-sectional surveys in Singapore, China and Italy

Jane M Lim; Zaw Myo Tun; Vishakha Kumar; Sharon Quaye; Vittoria Offeddu; Alex R Cook; May Oo Lwin; Shaohai Jiang; Clarence C Tam

The use of online survey methodologies has specific advantages during an epidemic, when there is a need to collect information quickly but when there may be challenges to the safe conduct of in-person community surveys. Our internet-based sampling strategy and survey dissemination via an online panel to a large number of respondents enabled the rapid deployment of a survey to track responses in near real-time, allowing us to study risk perception and behavioural changes during the early phases of an outbreak. A limitation of this approach is the trade-off in terms of population representativeness. Our sample shows a pronounced over-representation of respondents with at least a university education in both Singapore and China, which may affect the generalisability of our findings.