scholarly journals Taking the Cloth: How Religious Appeals Increase Compliance with COVID-19 Prevention Measures

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claire Adida ◽  
Christina Cottiero ◽  
Leonardo Falabella ◽  
Isabel Gotti ◽  
Syeda ShahBano Ijaz ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
United States ◽  
Social Norms ◽  
Social Identity Theory ◽  
Spillover Effects ◽  
The United States ◽  
Viral Transmission ◽  
Prevention Measures ◽  
Prevention Measure ◽  
Prevention Guidelines

During the COVID-19 pandemic, face masks have been recommended by the CDC and the WHO as key to reducing viral transmission. Yet, in the United States, one fifth of individuals say they wear masks at most some of the time, and a majority say that people in their community wear masks at most some of the time. What strategies most effectively encourage compliance with this critical covid-19 prevention measure? Relying on social identity theory, we experimentally assess two possible mechanisms of compliance, elite endorsement and social norms, among a representative sample of White U.S.–born Evangelicals, a group that has shown resistance to prevention measures. We find evidence for both mechanisms, but social norms play a remarkably important role – increasing support for mask-wearing by 6% with spillover effects on other prevention guidelines. Our findings confirm the role that appeals to norms and elite endorsements play in shaping individual behavior, and offer lessons for public health messaging.

scholarly journals A Social Network Model of the COVID-19 Pandemic

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pei Jun Zhao
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
United States ◽  
Social Distance ◽  
The United States ◽  
Viral Transmission ◽  
Model Parameters ◽  
Weighted Graphs ◽  
The Public ◽  
Health Measures ◽  
The U.S

AbstractIn the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, currently vaccines and specific anti-viral treatment are not yet available. Thus, preventing viral transmission by case isolation, quarantine, and social distancing is essential to slowing its spread. Here we model social networks using weighted graphs, where vertices represent individuals and edges represent contact. As public health measures are implemented, connectivity in the graph decreases, resulting in lower effective reproductive numbers, and reduced viral transmission. For COVID-19, model parameters were derived from the coronavirus epidemic in China, validated by epidemic data in Italy, then applied to the United States. We calculate that, in the U.S., the public is able to contain viral transmission by limiting the average number of contacts per person to less than 7 unique individuals over each 5 day period. This increases the average social distance between individuals to 10 degrees of separation.

scholarly journals Beliefs about Mask Efficacy and the Effect of Social Norms on Mask Wearing Intentions for COVID-19 Risk Reduction

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott E. Bokemper ◽  
Maria Cucciniello ◽  
Tiziano Rotesi ◽  
Paolo Pin ◽  
Amyn A. Malik ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
United States ◽  
Social Norms ◽  
Risk Reduction ◽  
Causal Relationship ◽  
The United States ◽  
Factual Information ◽  
The Public ◽  
Public Health Officials ◽  
Do So

AbstractIn the absence of widespread vaccination for COVID-19, governments and public health officials have advocated for the public to wear masks during the pandemic. The decision to wear a mask in public is likely affected by both beliefs about its efficacy and the prevalence of the behavior. Greater mask use in the community may encourage others to follow this norm, but it also creates an incentive for individuals to free ride on the protection afforded to them by others. We report the results of two vignette-based experiments conducted in the United States and Italy to examine the causal relationship between beliefs, social norms, and reported intentions to engage in mask promoting behavior. We find that providing factual information about how masks protect others increases the likelihood that someone would wear a mask or encourage others to do so in the United States, but not in Italy. There is no effect of providing information about how masks protect the wearer in either country. Additionally, greater mask use increases intentions to wear a mask and encourage someone else to wear theirs properly in both the United States and Italy. Thus, community mask use may be self-reinforcing.

scholarly journals Distinct patterns of SARS-CoV-2 transmission in two nearby communities in Wisconsin, USA

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gage Kahl Moreno ◽  
Katarina M Braun ◽  
Kasen K Riemersma ◽  
Michael A Martin ◽  
Peter J Halfmann ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
Viral Transmission ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Full Genome ◽  
Present Evidence ◽  
Viral Spread ◽  
Milwaukee County ◽  
At Home

Evidence-based public health approaches that minimize the introduction and spread of new SARS-CoV-2 transmission clusters are urgently needed in the United States and other countries struggling with expanding epidemics. Here we analyze 247 full-genome SARS-CoV-2 sequences from two nearby communities in Wisconsin, USA, and find surprisingly distinct patterns of viral spread. Dane County had the 12th known introduction of SARS-CoV-2 in the United States, but this did not lead to descendant community spread. Instead, the Dane County outbreak was seeded by multiple later introductions, followed by limited community spread. In contrast, relatively few introductions in Milwaukee County led to extensive community spread. We present evidence for reduced viral spread in both counties, and limited viral transmission between counties, following the statewide Safer-at-Home public health order, which went into effect 25 March 2020. Our results suggest that early containment efforts suppressed the spread of SARS-CoV-2 within Wisconsin.

scholarly journals Experimental evidence that changing beliefs about mask efficacy and social norms increase mask wearing for COVID-19 risk reduction: Results from the United States and Italy

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (10) ◽  
pp. e0258282
Author(s):  
Scott E. Bokemper ◽  
Maria Cucciniello ◽  
Tiziano Rotesi ◽  
Paolo Pin ◽  
Amyn A. Malik ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
United States ◽  
Social Norms ◽  
Experimental Evidence ◽  
Risk Reduction ◽  
Causal Relationship ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Public ◽  
Public Health Officials ◽  
Do So

In the absence of widespread vaccination for COVID-19, governments and public health officials have advocated for the public to wear masks during the pandemic. The decision to wear a mask in public is likely affected by both beliefs about its efficacy and the prevalence of the behavior. Greater mask use in the community may encourage others to follow this norm, but it also creates an incentive for individuals to free ride on the protection afforded to them by others. We report the results of two vignette-based experiments conducted in the United States (n = 3,100) and Italy (n = 2,659) to examine the causal relationship between beliefs, social norms, and reported intentions to engage in mask promoting behavior. In both countries, survey respondents were quota sampled to be representative of the country’s population on key demographics. We find that providing information about how masks protect others increases the likelihood that someone would wear a mask or encourage others to do so in the United States, but not in Italy. There is no effect of providing information about how masks protect the wearer in either country. Additionally, greater mask use increases intentions to wear a mask and encourage someone else to wear theirs properly in both the United States and Italy. Thus, community mask use may be self-reinforcing.

Looking for Something to Signify

Screen Bodies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 22-37
Author(s):  
David Yagüe González
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Social Norms ◽  
Daily Life ◽  
The United States ◽  
The One

The behaviors and actions that an individual carries out in their daily life and how they are translated by their society overdetermine the gender one might have—or not—according to social norms. However, do the postulates enounced by feminist and queer Western thinkers still maintain their validity when the context changes? Can the performances of gender carry out their validity when the landscape is other than the one in Europe or the United States? And how can the context of drag complicate these matters? These are the questions that this article will try to answer by analyzing the 2015 movie Viva by Irish director Paddy Breathnach.

Can increases in Twitter posts predict increases in cumulative incidence of COVID-19 in the United States? Evidence that social media can inform epidemic surveillance. (Preprint)

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruoyan Sun ◽  
Henna Budhwani
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
United States ◽  
Cumulative Incidence ◽  
Hot Spots ◽  
Adult Population ◽  
State Level ◽  
The United States ◽  
Education Attainment ◽  
Public Health Systems ◽  
Per Capita

BACKGROUND Though public health systems are responding rapidly to the COVID-19 pandemic, outcomes from publicly available, crowd-sourced big data may assist in helping to identify hot spots, prioritize equipment allocation and staffing, while also informing health policy related to “shelter in place” and social distancing recommendations. OBJECTIVE To assess if the rising state-level prevalence of COVID-19 related posts on Twitter (tweets) is predictive of state-level cumulative COVID-19 incidence after controlling for socio-economic characteristics. METHODS We identified extracted COVID-19 related tweets from January 21st to March 7th (2020) across all 50 states (N = 7,427,057). Tweets were combined with state-level characteristics and confirmed COVID-19 cases to determine the association between public commentary and cumulative incidence. RESULTS The cumulative incidence of COVID-19 cases varied significantly across states. Ratio of tweet increase (p=0.03), number of physicians per 1,000 population (p=0.01), education attainment (p=0.006), income per capita (p = 0.002), and percentage of adult population (p=0.003) were positively associated with cumulative incidence. Ratio of tweet increase was significantly associated with the logarithmic of cumulative incidence (p=0.06) with a coefficient of 0.26. CONCLUSIONS An increase in the prevalence of state-level tweets was predictive of an increase in COVID-19 diagnoses, providing evidence that Twitter can be a valuable surveillance tool for public health.

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