Need Support and Regulatory Focus in Responding to COVID-19

Prevention focus is a self-regulatory orientation that serves the need for security, and promotion focus is a self-regulatory orientation serves the need for growth. From mid-March to early April 2020, did people judge prevention focus to be more useful than promotion focus for responding to COVID-19? Our study tested this hypothesis with 401 American and Canadian participants, who we sampled in 100-person waves in the first four Thursdays of the pandemic. For this study, we developed a new measure of the judged usefulness of promotion and prevention focus. Results supported this hypothesis. Additionally, results showed that the judged usefulness of promotion and prevention focus related positively to support of the psychological needs for autonomy and relatedness, respectively, in responding to COVID-19. Day-to-day differences in autonomy, competence, and relatedness support and in promotion and prevention focus suggest that people were remarkably resilient in the early weeks of the pandemic. Our research could be useful for crafting persuasive advocacy and narrative communications that encourage social distancing to protect others about whom people care most

Need Support and Regulatory Focus in Responding to COVID-19

© Copyright © 2020 Vaughn, Garvey and Chalachan. Prevention focus is a self-regulatory orientation that serves the need for security, and promotion focus is a self-regulatory orientation that serves the need for growth. From mid-March to early April 2020, did people judge prevention focus to be more useful than promotion focus for responding to COVID-19? Our study tested and showed support for this hypothesis with 401 American and Canadian participants, who we sampled in 100-person waves on the first 4 Thursdays of the pandemic. For this study, we developed a new measure of the judged usefulness of promotion and prevention focus. Additionally, results showed that the judged usefulness of promotion and prevention focus related positively to support of the psychological needs for autonomy and relatedness, respectively, in responding to COVID-19. Exploratory analyses showed that day-to-day differences in autonomy, competence, and relatedness support and in promotion and prevention focus tended to be small, which is notable given the large-scale changes to social distancing, employment, and media coverage of the virus during this time. Our research could be useful for crafting persuasive advocacy and narrative communications that encourage social distancing to protect others about whom people care most

Feeling socially connected and focusing on growth: Relationships with well-being during a major holiday in the COVID-19 pandemic

Numerous major holidays celebrate socially gathering in person. However, in major holidays that happened during the pandemic, desires to nurture relationships and maintain holiday traditions often conflicted with physical distancing and other measures to protect against COVID-19. The current research sought to understand well-being during American Thanksgiving in 2020, which happened eight months into the COVID-19 pandemic, after months of physical distancing and stay-at-home orders. American Thanksgiving is a major holiday not limited to any religion. We asked 404 American adults how they spent Thanksgiving Day and to report on their experiences of that day. Predictors of well-being that we drew from self-determination theory were satisfaction of the fundamental needs for social connection (relatedness), for doing what one really wants (autonomy), and for feeling effective (competence). The predictors of well-being that we drew from regulatory focus theory were a focus on growth (promotion), and a focus on security (prevention). We found that feeling socially connected and focusing on growth related most strongly to well-being. Additionally, participants who saw even one other person face-to-face reported significantly higher relatedness satisfaction, promotion focus, and well-being than those who did not. Our research could help construct persuasive messages that encourage nurturing close relationships at major holidays while remaining safe against the virus