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Abstract

The aim of this study is to investigate social media use, health perception and health seeking behavior after coronavirus pandemic and their effect on fear of coronavirus. For this purpose, a questionnaire was applied with 1020 adult individuals over the age of 18. In addition to Introductory Information Form, the participants were given the Health Seeking Behaviour Scale, the Perception of Health Scale and the Fear of COVID-19 Scale. According to findigns of the study, people attach more importance to health-seeking behaviors showed increased fear of coronavirus People with high health perception have less fear of coronavirus. When the effect of time spent on social media on the fear of coronavirus was examined, the participants who spent more time on social media had increased fear of coronavirus. In conclusion, our study shows that after COVID-19 outbreak in Turkey, some populations appears to be more disadvantaged in terms of fear of coronavirus and health seeking behaviour. It is recommended to provide preventive psychological support services for these disadvantaged populations and to implement mechanisms that will prevent information pollution on social media and provide accurate information. In addition, social interventions that will increase the perception of health and cause positive changes in health seeking behaviours will be protective in terms of public health.

Keywords

• fear of coronavirus
• health perception
• social media use