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Using social media data to assess the impact of COVID-19 on mental health in China

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 April 2021

Yongjian Zhu Open the ORCID record for Yongjian Zhu [Opens in a new window] ,
Liqing Cao ,
Jingui Xie ,
Yugang Yu ,
Anfan Chen  and
Fengming Huang
Yongjian Zhu
Affiliation:
School of Management, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China
Liqing Cao*
Affiliation:
The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China
Jingui Xie
Affiliation:
School of Management, Technical University of Munich, Heilbronn, Germany
Yugang Yu
Affiliation:
School of Management, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China
Anfan Chen
Affiliation:
School of Humanity and Social Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China
Fengming Huang
Affiliation:
The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China
*
Author for correspondence: Liqing Cao, E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

Background

The outbreak and rapid spread of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) not only caused an adverse impact on physical health, but also brought about mental health problems among the public.

Methods

To assess the causal impact of COVID-19 on psychological changes in China, we constructed a city-level panel data set based on the expressed sentiment in the contents of 13 million geotagged tweets on Sina Weibo, the Chinese largest microblog platform.

Results

Applying a difference-in-differences approach, we found a significant deterioration in mental health status after the occurrence of COVID-19. We also observed that this psychological effect faded out over time during our study period and was more pronounced among women, teenagers and older adults. The mental health impact was more likely to be observed in cities with low levels of initial mental health status, economic development, medical resources and social security.

Conclusions

Our findings may assist in the understanding of mental health impact of COVID-19 and yield useful insights into how to make effective psychological interventions in this kind of sudden public health event.

Keywords

COVID-19difference-in-differencesmental healthsentiment analysissocial media
Type
Original Article
Information
Psychological Medicine , Volume 53 , Issue 2 , January 2023 , pp. 388 - 395
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

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