Conference Program

Group-based trajectories and predictors of adherence to four key sanitary measures during the COVID-19 pandemic (310203)

Clémentine Courdi, Université de Montréal 
Roxane de la Sablonnière, Université de Montréal 
Éric Lacourse, Université de Montréal 
Jean-Marc Lina, École de Technologie Supérieure de Montréal 
Mathieu Pelletier-Dumas, Université de Montréal 
*Sahar Ramazan Ali, Université de Montréal 
Dietlind Stolle, McGill University 

Keywords: COVID-19, adherence, sanitary measures, misinformation, health literacy, latent trajectories

This study explores how understanding of information, perceived coherence and sources’ reliability can influence adherence to health measures implemented by Canadian federal and provincial governments. Previous articles have highlighted the importance of promoting health literacy and minimizing misinformation to encourage higher adherence to key sanitary measures helping to prevent the spread of COVID-19. The data for this study was collected from a representative sample of 3617 Canadians, following a longitudinal design of 11 waves from April 2020 to April 2021. We examined adherence to sanitary measures in the long term by modeling latent trajectories of adherence to four key sanitary measures (staying home, social distancing, mask wearing and hand washing). On average, trajectories of high adherence were linear and regrouped over 80% of the population, while lower adherence trajectories showed more variation through time depending on the circumstances and regrouped only a small portion of the population. We then considered how the level of understanding of information, perceived coherence of measures and sources’ level of reliability can predict membership in these trajectories. Confounding variables such as age, gender, education, revenue, regions, immigration status and political identity were also considered. Overall, a low level of understanding does predict membership in lower adherence trajectories to sanitary measures (except for hand washing). Information sources’ reliability also had a significant effect, albeit less important, on adherence trajectories to some measures (staying home and social distancing), as individuals who trust mostly unreliable sources tend to follow lower adherence trajectories. Finally, perceived coherence did not have a significant effect on adherence to most measures, except for social distancing. These results highlight that it is essential to ensure good understanding of sanitary measures to promote adherence, regardless of so