Using MTurk to Capture Change: Tracking Perceptions of COVID-19 in a U.S. sample through the UO-EPIDeMIC Study

The University of Oregon’s “Emotions and Polarization in Decisions & Media in COVID-19” (UO-EPIDeMIC) study tracked perceptions of the COVID-19 pandemic from February 17th of 2020 through December 17th of 2020 in a single cohort of 1,284 American Mechanical Turk (MTurk) workers. Affect, attitudes, risk perceptions, intentions for protective behaviors, trust in various actors, media usage, and attitudes towards potential solutions were measured throughout the pandemic’s progression. Through six longitudinal waves of surveys, we demonstrate Mturk’s potential as a tool for recruiting high-quality longitudinal cohorts of participants. The data collected through these surveys have been used in various lines of research to learn about how individuals react and adapt to a global catastrophe.