Well-being in the time of COVID-19: Do metaphors and mindsets matter?

ABSTRACT

Communications about the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) often employ metaphors, which can help people understand complex issues. For example, public health messages may focus on "fighting" the disease, attempting to rouse people to action by instilling a sense of urgency. In contrast, change-focused metaphors may foster growth mindsets and self-efficacy-cornerstones of well-being and action. We randomly assigned participants to read one of two articles-either an article about coronavirus that focused on fighting the war or an article that highlighted the possibility of change. In Study 1 (N = 426), participants who read the war, relative to the change, message reported lower growth mindsets and self-efficacy and these in turn, predicted lower well-being and weaker intentions to engage in health behaviours. In Study 2, (N = 702), we sought to replicate findings and included a no treatment control. We failed to replicate the effects of message condition, although both messages predicted greater self-efficacy compared to the control. Similar to Study 1, growth mindsets predicted intentions to engage in recommended health behaviours and self-efficacy predicted both well-being and action. We discuss theoretical reasons for discrepancies as well as practical applications for developing public health communications.