Social Psychological Correlates of Protective Behaviours in the COVID-19 Outbreak: Evidence and Recommendations from a Nationally Representative Sample.

Background: A clear picture of people's adoption of protective behaviours, and a thorough understanding of psychosocial correlates in the context of contagious diseases such as COVID-19, is essential for the development of communication strategies, and can contribute to the fight against epidemics.

Methods: In this paper, we report a survey on the adoption of the recommended protective behaviours before and during the epidemic. We also assessed demographic correlates, and beliefs (towards COVID-19 and protective behaviours, towards SARS-CoV-2 transmission, social dilemma variables, and perceived external cues) of a representative sample of British residents.