Assessment of information overload of COVID-19 in the general public

Background: The overwhelming information about the coronavirus pandemic often makes it difficult to separate fact from fiction and rumour from deliberate efforts to mislead. People may find it difficult to understand and utilise genuine information from many sources simultaneously. In this pandemic situation, the general public may be at high risk of experiencing information overload on COVID-19, due to the frequent information in circulation. Therefore, we aimed to evaluate COVID-19 information overload (COVIO) among the general public.

Methods: This was a cross-sectional online survey using Google Forms ™. A hyperlink to the online questionnaire was shared with members of the general public via social media. The questionnaire consists of two sections. The first section covered the socio-demographic information of the respondents while the second section comprised of items measuring the covid-19 information overload.

Results: The total number of respondents was 579. The mean (standard deviation) age was 33 (8.7) years. The respondents were mostly females, 335 (57.9%) and married, 302 (52.2%). The commonest educational level attained by the respondents was postgraduate, 316 (54.6%). Most of the respondents are on full-time work, 280 (48.4%) and majority are on non-health related jobs, 302 (52.2%). Most respondents receive COVID-19 information from a combination of social media and broadcast media 372 (64.2%). The information was mostly solicited 316 (54.6%) and received daily 369 (63.7%). The mean (SD) COVIO score was 19.40 (4.12%). Among the eight items of the COVIO tool, three items showed higher tendency for COVIO. Majority of the respondents agreed that “information about COVID-19 all starts to sound the same after a while” 426 (73.6).

Conclusions: The findings from this study demonstrated that COVIO is a common phenomenon experienced in the general public. This necessitates a call for awareness and orientation on the best information seeking behaviours to avert being overloaded with especially wrong information.