The effects of governmental and individual predictors on COVID-19 protective behaviors in China: a path analysis model

The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has plunged the world into a crisis. To contain the crisis, it is essential to build full cooperation between the government and the public. However, it is unclear which governmental and individual factors are the determinants and how they interact on protective behaviors against COVID-19. To resolve this issue, this study built a multiple mediation model and found government emergency management as information transparency and positive propaganda had more important impacts on protective behaviors than refuting rumors and supplies. Moreover, governmental factors could indirectly affect protective behaviors through individual factors such as perceived control, positive emotions, and risk perception. These findings suggest that systematic intervention programs for governmental factors need to be integrated with individual factors to finally achieve effective prevention and control of the COVID-19 pandemic among the public.