RAPID: THE PSYCHOLOGICAL UNDERPINNINGS OF PANIC BUYING DURING THE COVID-19 OUTBREAK AND HOW TO MITIGATE THEM

  • Funded by National Science Foundation (NSF)
  • Total publications:0 publications

Grant number: 2027620

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Key facts

  • Disease

    COVID-19
  • Start & end year

    2020
    2021
  • Known Financial Commitments (USD)

    $135,825
  • Funder

    National Science Foundation (NSF)
  • Principal Investigator

    Mehdi Hossain
  • Research Location

    United States of America
  • Lead Research Institution

    University of Rhode Island
  • Research Priority Alignment

    N/A
  • Research Category

    Policies for public health, disease control & community resilience

  • Research Subcategory

    Approaches to public health interventions

  • Special Interest Tags

    N/A

  • Study Type

    Non-Clinical

  • Clinical Trial Details

    N/A

  • Broad Policy Alignment

    Pending

  • Age Group

    Adults (18 and older)

  • Vulnerable Population

    Unspecified

  • Occupations of Interest

    Unspecified

Abstract

Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences - The coronavirus pandemic has influenced people?s marketplace behaviors. Panic buying has been evident among consumers all over the world, incurring substantial costs to the buyer, the society, and the marketplace. Hoarding and stockpiling creates shortage of supplies for necessities, depriving others who might be needing them the most in the situation (e.g., health care providers, older individuals), and artificially hikes price levels. For the panic buyer, this behavior creates inventory management problems. This research focuses on the consumer psychology of panic buying and how the media, policy makers, government officials and retailers can frame their communication with the general public at times of such unprecedented events, aiming to mitigate the psychological triggers of this behavior. The current research illuminates the psychological remedies of panic buying, and prescribes actions that may protect the supply chain, ensure equal distribution of necessities among the population, control price hikes of necessities, and extend consumers? financial well-being in pandemic like situations.

This research is two interrelated studies aimed at tackling the problem of panic buying owing to the COVID-19 pandemic. The first study explores the underlying psychological processes of panic buying during the ongoing crisis. Through an online survey, a U.S. national pool of 2750 respondents provides measures of relevant psychological factors and proneness to panic buying. The second study uses findings from the first study to develop communication frames and materials. The researcher then randomly assigns respondents to different conditions and evaluates the efficacy of the different conditions to reducing panic buying and hoarding.

This project is jointly funded by DRMS and the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR).

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.