Understanding COVID-19 attributions: the moderating role of global orientations on prosocial and pro-environmental responses across 35 cultures

The COVID-19 pandemic has presented an unprecedented global health crisis, raising important questions about how individuals attribute responsibility to the pandemic and how these attributions shape psychological responses. Drawing on attribution theory, stigma theory, and the globalization orientations framework, the present study examined two moderated mediation models to clarify the associations among attribution (personal attribution and environmental attribution), global orientations (multicultural acquisition and ethnic protection), and psychological responses (stigma, willingness to volunteer, and pro-environmental attitude and behavior) during the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants were 18,171 adults across 35 countries/societies. Results showed that personal attribution of COVID-19 was associated with increased stigma toward infected individuals, which in turn reduced willingness to volunteer. This negative indirect effect was buffered by multicultural acquisition and exacerbated by ethnic protection. Moreover, environmental attribution was positively associated with both self-reported and actual pro-environmental behavior through pro-environmental attitude. Notably, ethnic protection strengthened these positive indirect effects, while multicultural acquisition did not significantly moderate this pathway. These findings provide specific insights into how attributional processes and global orientations jointly affect responses to a global health challenge. The results highlight the importance of fostering multicultural acquisition to reduce stigma and promote volunteering, while also recognizing that even a defensive response to globalization can motivate pro-environmental action when environmental threats are salient. Our research informs the design of anti-stigma programs and pro-environmental initiatives by emphasizing the roles of attribution and global orientations. Future research should employ more robust behavioral measures to further elucidate these complex relationships across diverse contexts.