“Will I Get Sick?”: Parents’ explanations to children’s questions about a novel illness

Abstract

When encountered with a novel illness, children often ask for information about the illness and its impact on health from their parents. Although prior studies have explored how parents generally described the coronavirus to their children, there is an ambiguity in whether parents’ explanations about the coronavirus were about the coronavirus itself or about the pandemic more generally. Furthermore, it remains to be explored how parents responded to questions about the impact of the coronavirus on health. So, the current study explored how parents (N = 425) responded to specific questions that sought out information about the coronavirus and its impact. The results suggest that parents use their child’s specific questions as an opportunity to foster their child’s understanding about an illness. At the same time, parents also use their responses to shield their child from potential upsetting information about the impact of the coronavirus on health and well-being.