In early 2020, the COVID-19 spread to all parts of China and even other countries in a short period of time. The severe epidemic situation would put a psychological pressure on the public, resulting in anxiety, panic and other emotions, even some irrational behavior such as scare buying and becoming credulous of rumors. The risk preference is defined as the degree of the risk that people are willing to accept in their decisions and behaviors. In this public health emergency, the consumers' purchase and use of sanitary and epidemic prevention products reflects their risk preference. This paper explores the relationship between the public risk preference and the purchase behavior through a questionnaire survey, and it is found that the factors influencing the purchase behavior mainly include the gender factors, the perceived risk level and the severity of the epidemic situation in the residence area, as indicated by the Association Rule Mining.

risk preference  /  mask  /  purchase behavior  /  COVID-19