JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

In these exceptional times stemming from the outbreak of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), people are staying in their homes and following the precautionary social distancing measures that governments have announced. Social media networks—including Twitter, for example¬—are the perfect tools for communicating with others during the pandemic. With social media, people can send and collect information, as well as express their feelings about and reactions to what people are experiencing amid the unusual COVID-19 crisis. Exploring the content posted on these platforms may help with understanding the factors affecting the mental health of the general public at the present time, their future psychological immunity, and their physical health.

Objective:

This study aims to promote an understanding of the content that Arabic Twitter users shared on the platform between April and May 2020 in order to explore and describe people's opinions and feelings about the implications of the COVID-19 outbreak on their lives by identifying that content’s main and subthemes. The main objective of the study is to identify the most common content in a sample of tweets posted between April and May 2020 by Arabic Twitter users discussing the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak on their lives.

Methods:

To achieve the study’s goal, the researchers tracked and monitored people’s feelings and reactions through 1,100 tweets that were randomly collected through selected hashtags. The tweets were categorized based on their content into main and subthemes, using the qualitative content analysis methodology.

Results:

The findings showed that factors that influence mental health, such as anxiety, isolation, and feelings of fear and panic of infection, followed by COVID-19-related preventive instructions, constituted the most commonly shared content of the tweets, along with academic and career topics (e.g., long-distance study and work).

Conclusions:

The analysis of the data will provide valuable information that governments and relevant organizations can use as an early warning system for better managing pandemics and other crises. This understanding may also help public health organizations to properly plan social media content and to disseminate the correct information regarding disease outbreaks and their effects on the world and local population.