Table 2.

Descriptive statistics of the independent variables, the mediator, and the dependent variable (N=23,863).

Variables				Participants
Cognitive factors, n (%)
	Perceived airborne transmission
		No/do not know	18,273 (76.6)
		Yes	5590 (23.4)
	Perceived Infection Risk Indicatora
		0	18,779 (78.7)
		1	1846 (7.7)
		2	1707 (7.2)
		3	1531 (6.4)
	Perceived permanent bodily damage
		Disagree/do not know	15,340 (64.3)
		Agree	8523 (35.7)
	Perceived chance of controlling the epidemic within 6 months
		Else	7149 (30.0)
		Definitely yes/very high	16,714 (70.0)
Behavioral factors, n (%)
	Time spent going out during CNYb (hours)
		≥15	1295 (5.4)
		11-14	1233 (5.2)
		5-10	4156 (17.4)
		1-4	5422 (22.7)
		0	11,757 (49.3)
	Close contacts with people who had visited Wuhan 2 weeks before CNY
		No or do not know	22,704 (95.1)
		Yes	1159 (4.9)
Psychosocial factors, n (%)
	Perceived discrimination due to COVID-19
		Very low	9989 (41.9)
		Low	8750 (36.7)
		High	3690 (15.5)
		Very high	1434 (6.0)
Mental distress to COVID-19, mean (SD)				6.9 (2.2)
	0, n (%)			12,628 (52.9)
	1, n (%)			2892 (12.1)
	2, n (%)			1910 (8.0)
	3, n (%)			6433 (27.0)
Depression (PHQ-9c), mean (SD)				4.6 (5.5)
	Normal, n (%)			14,537 (60.9)
	Mild, n (%)			5862 (24.6)
	Moderate, moderately severe, or severe, n (%)			3464 (14.5)

^aThe Perceived Infection Risk Indicator counted the number of endorsements of “high/very high” for three items about perceived risk of infection for oneself, family members, and classmates; the indicator counted the number of endorsements of “high/very high” for three items measuring negative psychological responses to COVID-19; details are described in the Methods section.

^bCNY: Chinese Lunar New Year.

^cPHQ-9: Patient Health Questionaire-9.