Stories of Life during the First Wave of the COVID-19 Pandemic in Italy: A Qualitative Study
UMass Chan Affiliations
Department of PsychiatryDocument Type
Journal ArticlePublication Date
2021-07-18Keywords
COVID-19coronavirus
health psychology
personal construct theory
qualitative research
Health Psychology
Infectious Disease
International Public Health
Psychiatry and Psychology
Virus Diseases
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The COVID-19 pandemic has imposed on people the need to find meaning in many unprecedented ways. The aim of this qualitative study was to explore how the general Italian population dealt with government restrictions and to understand personal experiences connected with the first wave of the pandemic in light of the personal construct theory (PCT) framework. One hundred and sixteen people (over 18 years old) completed an online survey between May and June 2020. Two independent researchers ran inductive thematic content analysis on data using a specifically developed international codebook. Five major themes were identified in the participants' narrations: difficulties, emotions, coping with lockdown measures, going back to normal, and change. The results, interpreted within the PCT transitions, showed that the pandemic represented a threat to participants' life plans, beliefs, and certainties. Some coped with it mainly by waiting for the pandemic to end and remaining firm in their beliefs and certainties, whereas others coped by trying to find alternative ways of giving sense to this experience and reconstructing personal meanings, claiming a change in their life and in society. Differentiating personal experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic is fundamental for designing personalised strategies to promote well-being.Source
Tomaino SCM, Cipolletta S, Kostova Z, Todorova I. Stories of Life during the First Wave of the COVID-19 Pandemic in Italy: A Qualitative Study. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2021 Jul 18;18(14):7630. doi: 10.3390/ijerph18147630. PMID: 34300081; PMCID: PMC8304996. Link to article on publisher's site
DOI
10.3390/ijerph18147630Permanent Link to this Item
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14038/27479PubMed ID
34300081Related Resources
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Copyright © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).Distribution License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.3390/ijerph18147630
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Except where otherwise noted, this item's license is described as Copyright © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).