Facilitating the Public Response to COVID-19: Group Processes and Mutual Aid

This chapter seeks to understand the psychological facilitators of active community engagement with the public health response to successful responses to disease outbreaks. It summarises research on the key psychological predictors of engagement in protective behaviours in the COVID-19 pandemic, it describes how mutual aid groups have helped people to shield and self-isolate during the pandemic, and it summarises research on the factors that have sustained these groups over time. It draws out the general principles and the policy and practice implications that emerge from the research on this topic. The focus is largely on evidence from the UK, although many of the points covered in this chapter apply equally to the situation in other countries.