Introduction: Anxiety levels of undergraduate nursing students (UNS) compared to non-health-related majors (UGS) during the early COVID-19 pandemic remain unstudied. Purpose: To evaluate whether key avoidance behaviors negatively impacted UNS anxiety levels. Hypothesis: UNS have higher self-reported compliance with avoidance behaviors than UGS. Methods: 30,996 Kent State University students were surveyed, and 5,547 responses were obtained. Anxiety was assessed using the PROMIS emotional distress short forms v1.0 (Cella et al., 2010; Cronbach’s α = .95). Results: UNS reported lower anxiety than UGS. There was no  relationship between program of study and adoption of avoidance behaviors. Conclusion: Dissemination of COVID-19 public
health information and university communications may have increased the use of avoidance behaviors. Further study is needed to explain lower anxiety in UNS. References: Cella, D., Riley, W., Stone, A., Rothrock, N., Reeve, B., Yount, S., ... & Cook, K. (2010). The Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS) developed and tested its first wave of adult self-reported health outcome item banks: 2005– 2008. Journal of clinical epidemiology, 63(11), 1179-1194. Ersin F, Kartal M. (2020). The determination of the perceived stress levels and health protective behaviors of nursing students during the COVID19 pandemic. Perspect Psychiatric Care, 1–7. https://doi.org/10.1111/ppc.12636.