Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2020 Aug 26;20(1):1292.
doi: 10.1186/s12889-020-09392-z.

A cross-sectional survey of knowledge, attitude and practice associated with COVID-19 among undergraduate students in China

Yaling Peng  1 , Chenchen Pei  2 , Yan Zheng  1 , Juan Wang  1 , Kui Zhang  1 , Zhaohui Zheng  1 , Ping Zhu  3
Affiliations

A cross-sectional survey of knowledge, attitude and practice associated with COVID-19 among undergraduate students in China

Yaling Peng et al. BMC Public Health. .

Abstract

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has become a great threat to public health, which has greatly impacted the study and life of undergraduate students in China. This study aims to perform a survey of their knowledge, attitude and practice (KAP) associated with COVID-19.

Methods: A cross-sectional survey was designed to gather information regarding the COVID-19 related KAP among undergraduates during the home isolation in the outbreak. Subjects were recruited from 10 universities in Shaanxi Province, China. Enrollees voluntarily submitted their answers to a pre-designed questionnaire online.

Results: A total of 872 subjects (female, 534; male, 338) were enrolled with ages from 17 to 25 years old. This cohort included 430 medical and 442 non-medical students, 580 freshmen and 292 higher school year students. There were 453 from public schools and 442 from private school, residing in 28 regions and provinces at the time of study. Results showed that appropriate knowledge was acquired by 82.34% subjects; the levels were significantly higher in undergraduates from public universities and medical majors than those from private schools and non-medical majors (p<0.05). 73.81% subjects reported positive attitudes; females showed significantly higher levels of positive attitudes than males (p<0.05). Proactive practice was found in 87.94% subjects. Using a common scoring method, the overall scores for Knowledge, Attitude and Practice were 4.12 ± 0.749 (range: 0 ~ 5), 8.54 ± 1.201 (range: 0 ~ 10), and 8.91 ± 1.431 (range: 0 ~ 10), respectively. There was a positive correlation between attitude and practice (r = 0.319, p < 0.05) in the whole study group. Total KAP score was 21.57 ± 2.291 (range: 0 ~ 25), which was significantly different between gender groups and major groups.

Conclusions: Most undergraduates acquired necessary knowledge, positive attitude and proactive practice in response to COVID-19 outbreak; but their KAP scores significantly varied by gender, major and school types.

Keywords: COVID-19; Knowledge, attitude and practice; Undergraduates.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

References

    1. Zhu N, Zhang DY, Wang WL, Li XW, Yang B, Song JD, et al. A novel coronavirus from patients with pneumonia in China. N Engl J Med. 2020;382(8):727–733. doi: 10.1056/NEJMoa2001017. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. World Health Organization. Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) Papua New Guinea Situation Report 6. https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/wpro%2D%2D-documents/countries/p... Accessed 9 Jul 2020.
    1. Wang C, Horby PW, Hayden FG, Gao GF. A novel coronavirus outbreak of global health concern. Lancet. 2020;395(10223):470–473. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30185-9. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. World Health Organization. Timeline of WHO’s response to COVID-19. https://www.who.int/news-room/detail/29-06-2020-covidtimeline. Accessed 9 Jul 2020.
    1. World Health Organization. Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) Situation Report – 183. https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/wha-70-and-phe/20200721-covid-19.... Accessed 22 Jul 2020.

LinkOut - more resources