“I’m Not Comfortable With COVID, But …”: Dilemmas and Decision-Making to Mitigate Risks Among Mothers Who Gave Birth During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Individuals have faced unprecedented uncertainty and risk surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, and decision-making dilemmas have been complicated by quickly evolving and often contradictory recommendations for staying healthy. Using tenets of problematic integration theory and risk orders theory, we analyzed interview data from 50 mothers who gave birth during the pandemic to understand how uncertainty and risk perceptions shaped their decision-making about keeping themselves and their infants healthy in the first year after birth. Results describe how some mothers in our sample made sense of their decision-making to prioritize first-order risks to their own and their family’s physical health, and other mothers prioritized second-order risks to their relationships and identities. We also discuss the social nature of mitigating risk during the COVID-19 pandemic and the catalysts for shifting risk perceptions. Theoretical and practical implications include improving public health messaging and clinical conversations to enable individuals to effectively manage social and identity needs alongside serious threats to physical health.