Predictors of Adherence to Personal Preventive Behaviors Among Nursing Students Based on Health Belief Model: Cross Sectional Study During the Second Wave of COVID-19 Pandemic in Indonesia

Introduction: Personal preventive behaviors was cited as effective strategy to prevent the SARS-CoV-2 transmissions. When vaccine become available, preventive behavior must still be implemented to significantly decreased the COVID-19 infection risk in the emergence of novel SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern with immune escape phenotype. The Health Belief Model (HBM) is the most widely recognized behaviour theory, but its capacity to predict the preventive behaviours have been inconsistent. This study aimed to assess predictors adherence to COVID-19 preventive behaviour among nursing students based on HBM during the second wave of COVID-19 in Indonesia. Methods: An online cross-sectional study was conducted from May to September 2021. Undergraduate nursing students (n=1,413) from 10 universities in Indonesia was recruited using consecutive sampling. Online self-administered questionnaire was used to collect the data. Binary logistic regression was employed to analyse the association between sociodemographic and HBM construct with adherence to preventive behaviors. Results: Most of the students (n=804; 56.9 ) had poor adherence to COVID-19 preventive behaviors, and poor physical distancing identified as the most dominant non-adherence type (n=774; 54.8 ). First year students (AOR=1.313; 95CI: 1.020-1.690), low perceived susceptibility (AOR=1.530; 95CI: 1.193-1.962), low perceived severity (AOR= 1.756; 95CI: 1.337-2.307), low perceived effectiveness (AOR=1.910; 95CI: 1.315-2.777), and low self-efficacy (AOR=4.795; 95CI: 3.566-6.447) significantly associated with poor adherence (p<0.05). Nagelkerke R square value was 0.313 suggesting that the whole model explained 31.3 of variance in adherence. Conclusion: Intervention that targeting health belief model could be useful to increased adherence level to COVID-19 preventive measures among nursing students. © 2023 UPM Press. All rights reserved.