Introduction
The pandemic COVID-19 has left not even a single person untouched from its direct or indirect negative consequences. COVID-19 is a highly infectious leading to severe respiratory disease with the symptoms of cough, breathing problems, fever, chills, repeated shaking with chills, muscle pain, headache, sore throat and new loss of taste or smell (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2020; World Health Organization, 2020a). Its severity can be understood in terms of the number of people it has inflicted in a very short period. It has been reported that there were 3, 018, 681 confirmed and 207, 973 death cases due to the infection of COVID-19 as on April 30, 2020 (World Health Organization, 2020).
Unlike previous epidemics, COVID-19 is very fatal, unknown and unexpected. It has been argued that an epidemic gives rise to parallel complex social and psychological processes which become an epidemic in itself (Strong, 1990). These psycho-social epidemics lead to fear and explanation and may culminate in distrust, uncertainty, ridiculousness, propaganda, terror, social stigma, avoidance, separation, exploitation and multiple theories of the origin of disease and misconceptions among people (Strong, 1990; Weber & Goldmeier, 1983). These factors may lead to many social, psychological, economic and health ill-consequences for people of all age groups and origins (United Nations Organization, 2020). Recent studies have reported many negative psychological and other life outcomes due to COVID-19. For example, the researchers have reported that the current pandemic causes extreme stress, anger, restrictions and fear of infection (Brooks et al., 2020) and panic experiences, feeling of isolation, anxiety, irritability, lowered social support and a variety of negative health outcomes for children and adults (Jiao et al., 2020; Tiwari et al., 2020).
The universal severe threat caused by COVID-19 may be argued to pose serious challenges to the self-integrity and self-worth of people due. People use a variety of psychological mechanisms to protect their self-integrity and self-worth and self-affirmation has been suggested as one of the positive mechanisms people use to protect them and face challenges of life (Steele, 1988). Self-affirmation refers to a set of motivational processes that help people to regain their self-integrity and self-worth in the face of threats (David K. Sherman & Cohen, 2006; Steele, 1988). Self-integrity and self-worth are socially shared conceptions and originate from socio-cultural and historical processes (Alexander, 2014) and suggested to be helpful for people for its unique ability to cultivate cognitive flexibility (Geoffrey L. Cohen et al., 2007), positive social comparisons in times of failure (Pettit & Lount, 2010), collective identity (Binning et al., 2010), reduction of prejudice (David K. Sherman & Kim, 2005), positive health outcomes (David K. Sherman et al., 2000) on the one hand and to lower negative psychological and physiological outcomes on the other (J. D. Creswell et al., 2005). These benefits may be more valid for people brought up in individualistic culture who carry independent self as it may differ in the basic structure and dynamics from interdependent self (Cai et al., 2013). Independent self-construal represents a focus on the protection of individual rights and cognitions. Conversely, interdependent or relational self-construal features connection, relation and wide social units (Markus & Kitayama, 1991). Thus, the benefits of independent self-affirmation may not be directly generalized to the individual having interdependent self-construal (Cai et al., 2013).
The relational self may comprise familial self and close-other self and its defensiveness-soothing caused by relational self-affirmation effects may occur due to the familial bonds (Heine & Lehman, 1997; Hoshino-Browne et al., 2005). Relational self-affirmation may be more useful for people of Indian society which is collectivistic in nature. Relational self-affirmation may be more guided by interdependence, affiliation and social harmony (Hoshino-Browne et al., 2005). The major precursor of relational self is the unique familial value which is orientated towards relationships and others’ concerns (Gaines et al., 1997). Familialism has been conceptualized as a cultural value involving interdependent, emotional and relatively permanent relationships (Cai et al., 2013). Familial bonds may comprise groupness, shared identity, deep attachments and unique socialization, emotionality and meaning (Scabini & Manzi, 2010). Researchers have argued that these basic differences in two types of self-construal may have significant implications for affirmation processes (Cai et al., 2013; Hoshino-Browne et al., 2005; Tiwari et al., 2020).
The Indian value system is characterized by collectivism, conformity to norms, deference to authority, emotional self-control, achieving for family recognition, humbleness, hierarchical nature of relationships and avoidance of shame and these values help in developing a positive self-concept (Iwamoto & Liu, 2010; Kim et al., 1999; Kim & Omizo, 2005). Likewise, attitudes, values and perceptions are shaped according to the nature of socialization practices (Helms & Cook, 1999). Indian joint family is a unique institution which has been suggested to cultivate a set of collective values that may shape the self-affirmation process distinct from a nuclear family prominent in individualistic societies. Interdependent self-construal and collective values cultivated by the Indian joint family may prompt the affirmation process in Indian people in the face of pandemic threat through a positive feedback loop between the self-system and the social system (G. L. Cohen & Sherman, 2014) and may have motivated them to follow the desirable restrictions leading to the mass support instead of opposition (Tiwari et al., 2020).
Religiousness denotes beliefs, practices and experiences linked with organized traditions (Cheadle & Dunkel Schetter, 2017) which also include spirituality (Harris et al., 2018). Hindu religion is one of the oldest religions and its present form has been evolved from a long assimilation process. Worshipping idols of God and Goddess, reading religious texts and carrying out hawan and pooja (a kind of sacrifice) is most popular in India. It is said that Hinduism is not a single religion but a way of life that provides for the doctrines of samsara (purification) and karma (the universal law of cause and effect), soul, moksha (salvation) and dharma (a code of living) (History.com Editors, 2019). These core features have significant influences on the social behaviours of the majority of the Indians (History.com Editors, 2019). In a recent study, core values of religion have been found to facilitate self-affirmation by augmenting self-integrity and self-worth resulting in enhanced adherence to clinical prescriptions (Bormann et al., 2013; Kemppainen et al., 2012; Smith, 2019). Moreover, there is little consensus of the origin and mechanisms inherent in self-affirmation shaping life outcomes (Alexander, 2014). The current study aims to explore the role of familial and religious practices in easing independent and interdependent self-affirmations in the relevant values in facing the threat of COVID-19 in a heterogeneous sample by employing the Narrative Thematic Analysis Method (J. W. Creswell, 2014). The use of qualitative methods has been suggested to be useful where there is no guiding framework or theory to explore a phenomenon (J. W. Creswell, 2004, 2014). Besides, it was not possible to collect data on a large sample through quantitative measures due to the strict nationwide lockdown in India.
Methods
Nineteen participants (Age Range = 25-43 years, Mean Age = 33.63, SD = 508) were chosen through a purposive sampling method take part in a qualitative study. Out of these, 10 were from the joint families (Age Range = 25-43 Years, Mean Age = 34.50, SD = 5.23) and 9 were from the nuclear families (N = 9, Age Range = 27-41 Years, Mean Age = 332.67, SD = 5.03). The participants belonged to [BLINDED FOR REVIEW]. The detailed demographic information has been displayed in Table 1.
Table 1. Biographic information of the participants
S. No. | Age | Gender | Family | Family Size | Domicile | Education | Marital Status |
1. | 33 | Male | Nuclear | 3 | Urban | Postgraduation | Unmarried |
2. | 30 | Female | Nuclear | 3 | Urban | Postgraduation | Married |
3. | 30 | Female | Nuclear | 3 | Urban | M. Phil | Unmarried |
4. | 34 | Female | Joint | 7 | Urban | Postgraduation | Married |
5. | 30 | Male | Joint | 7 | Urban | Postgraduation | Married |
6. | 29 | Female | Nuclear | 3 | Urban | Postgraduation | Married |
7. | 27 | Male | Nuclear | 5 | Rural | Graduation | Unmarried |
8. | 25 | Male | Joint | 6 | Urban | Graduation | Unmarried |
9. | 30 | Female | Joint | 6 | Rural | Ph.D. | Unmarried |
10. | 29 | Female | Nuclear | 4 | Urban | Postgraduation | Unmarried |
11. | 33 | Male | Joint | 9 | Rural | Postgraduation | Married |
12. | 35 | Male | Nuclear | 4 | Urban | Postgraduation | Unmarried |
13. | 38 | Female | Joint | 8 | Rural | Graduation | Married |
14. | 39 | Male | Joint | 8 | Urban | Graduation | Married |
15. | 40 | Male | Nuclear | 4 | Rural | Ph.D. | Unmarried |
16. | 41 | Female | Nuclear | 3 | Urban | Graduation | Married |
17. | 43 | Male | Joint | 9 | Rural | Postgraduation | Unmarried |
18. | 37 | Male | Joint | 8 | Urban | Graduation | Married |
19. | 36 | Female | Joint | 10 | Urban | Graduation | Married |