Coping with COVID-19-induced threats to self
- Resource Type
- Authors
- Edward P. Lemay; Erica Molinario; Arie W. Kruglanski
- Source
- Group Processes & Intergroup Relations. 24:284-289
- Subject
- Cultural Studies
Coping (psychology)
2019-20 coronavirus outbreak
Sociology and Political Science
Social Psychology
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)
Self-affirmation
Communication
Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)
05 social sciences
050109 social psychology
03 medical and health sciences
0302 clinical medicine
Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous)
Pandemic
0501 psychology and cognitive sciences
Direct consequence
Psychology
Social psychology
030217 neurology & neurosurgery
- Language
- ISSN
- 1461-7188
1368-4302
Whereas the COVID-19 pandemic induces in people both uncertainty and angst, the latter may not be a direct consequence of uncertainty as such, but rather of the possible negative outcomes whose subjective certainty increased under the pandemic. From this perspective, we discuss the psychological determinants of people’s reactions to the pandemic and their modes of self-affirmation in response to pandemic-implied threats. Those reactions are guided by value-oriented narratives that may variously drive people’s pro- and anti-social behaviors during the pandemic.