Cultural values predict national COVID-19 death rates

Ruck, Damian J.; Borycz, Joshua; Bentley, R. Alexander

doi:10.1007/s43545-021-00080-2

Cited by 6 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 26 publications

(43 reference statements)

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“…Thus, our study demonstrates that flexibility-monumentalism is a unique national cultural trait that explains cross-country variations in COVID-19 mortality in 2020. The study contributes new evidence to the existing literature on the relationship between national culture and COVID-19 infection and death rates (Salvador et al, 2020;Dheer et al, 2021;Gelfand et al, 2021;Gokmen et al, 2021;Güss and Tuason, 2021;Kumar, 2021;Ozkan et al, 2021;Ruck et al, 2021;Schopf, 2022).…”

Section: Main Findingsmentioning

confidence: 70%

“…Several studies have shown that national cultural traits predict COVID-19 infection and mortality rates (Salvador et al, 2020;Dheer et al, 2021;Gelfand et al, 2021;Gokmen et al, 2021;Güss and Tuason, 2021;Ozkan et al, 2021;Ruck et al, 2021): collectivism and tight social norms are associated with lower rates of COVID-19 infections and deaths, whereas cosmopolitanism is associated with higher infection and mortality rates. Scholars have also examined other prominent national cultural traits and COVID-19 infection and/or mortality rates and found significant associations between them.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Flexible societies excelled in saving lives in the first phase of the COVID-19 pandemic

Akaliyski

Heisig

et al. 2022

Front. Psychol.

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BackgroundPrevious studies have shown that national cultural traits, such as collectivism–individualism and tightness–looseness, are associated with COVID-19 infection and mortality rates. However, although East Asian countries have outperformed other countries in containing COVID-19 infections and lowering mortality in the first pandemic waves, no studies to date have examined flexibility-monumentalism, a cultural trait that uniquely distinguishes East Asia from the rest of the world. Moreover, none of the previous studies have explored mechanisms underpinning the association between national culture and COVID-19 mortality.AimsOur study fills in these gaps by examining the association between flexibility-monumentalism and COVID-19 mortality, adjusting for important covariates and by analyzing mask wearing and fear of COVID-19 during the first weeks of the pandemic as plausible mechanisms underpinning this association.MethodsWe constructed and analyzed a dataset including 37 countries that have valid information on flexibility-monumentalism, COVID-19 deaths as of 31 October 2020 (before the start of vaccination campaigns), and relevant covariates including two other national cultural traits (individualism–collectivism and tightness–looseness) and other national characteristics (economic, political, demographic and health). Multiple linear regression with heteroscedasticity-consistent standard errors was used to assess the independent effect of flexibility-monumentalism on COVID-19 mortality. Mediation was assessed by examining the indirect effects of flexibility through mask wearing and fear of COVID-19 and determining the statistical significance through bootstrapping. Graphical and delete-one analysis was used to assess the robustness of the results.ResultsWe found that flexibility was associated with a significant reduction in COVID-19 mortality as of 31 October 2020, independent of level of democracy, per capita GDP, urbanization, population density, supply of hospital beds, and median age of the population. This association with mortality is stronger and more robust than for two other prominent national cultural traits (individualism–collectivism and tightness–looseness). We also found tentative evidence that the effect of flexibility on COVID-19 mortality may be partially mediated through mask wearing in the first weeks of the pandemic.

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Section: Main Findingsmentioning

confidence: 70%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Flexible societies excelled in saving lives in the first phase of the COVID-19 pandemic

Akaliyski

Heisig

et al. 2022

Front. Psychol.

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“…Auto, aviation, shipbuilding, and other industries have been drawn into a severe recession. Even though a number of researchers argue that the stability of values is relatively high and their restructuring over a short period of time (that is, over the course of the coronavirus pandemic) is impossible [Giavazzi et al, 2014], others rest on the belief that the impact of pandemics on cultural values is significant [Barro et al, 2020;Ruck et al, 2021].…”

Section: Inglehart and Welzel's Mapmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The depth of a recession influences perceptions of economic and physical security concerns, the level of people's trust in government, lifestyle patterns, and their willingness to invest their own money in universal healthcare systems. Or, as the authors of the article "Cultural Values Predict National COVID-19 Death Rates" note, governments in more tolerant and democratic countries are having difficulty mitigating the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic because the population and institutions of these countries are characterized by self-expression values instead of survival [Ruck et al, 2021].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pandemic Parameters 2020-2021 by Socio-Cultural Groups of Countries - Applied Analysis

Grigoriev¹,

Maykhrovich²,

Serova³

et al. 2022

IORJ

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Sociocultural factors have become a one of the priority areas in research within the framework of theories of long-term development. This article discusses the parameters of groups of countries (values of survival-self-expression and traditional-secular-rational values) according to the Inglehart- Welzel cultural map, along with other sociocultural and socioeconomic indicators. The significant cumulative advantage (gross domestic product (GDP) per capita) of three groups of countries - Anglo-Saxon, Protestant and Catholic - —compared to the rest reflects a long history of world progress. A number of the social parameters of these groups probably reflect their level of development, to which other factors have played a role in the long term. A key question addressed in the article. is whether sociocultural factors that have developed over long periods have a significant impact on the behaviour of countries in the context of modern crises, and in this case, on the incidence of vaccination in countries in critical conditions. To answer this question, qualitative and quantitative methods of analysis have been conducted using the instance of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020-21. The hypothesis was tested on an array of 80-94 countries for which there was relevant statistical data. The tables and calculations presented in the article indicate the following results: countries more advanced in the direction of self-expression values on the Inglehart scale demonstrate higher vaccination scores and lower disease scores, and those oriented toward secular-rational values have higher rates of suicide than countries with predominantly traditional views.

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“…There are also many other determinants in literature describing the different relationships between COVID contagion and death rate as prevalence of Black and Hispanic populations (Cheng et al 2020), partisanship (Gadarian et al 2021), average Y-DNA haplogroup percentages (Delanghe et al 2020;Ibrahim -Salih 2021;Schillaci 2021), cosmopolitanism, government efficiency and public trust in institutions (Dinc a et al 2020;Ruck et al 2021), transport infrastructure quality score (Liang et al 2020), commuting via public transportation and driving into work (relative to telecommuting), higher home values, higher summer temperatures and lower winter temperatures (Knittel -Ozaltun 2020), density of the population (Doti 2020), households with a mortgage, land cover with forest, people living in group quarter and airborne benzene concentration (Luo et al 2021) and so on. These indicators should be considered in the overall assessment of the COVID pandemic, but from the perspective of this study, their impact on CFR should be negligible.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

COVID-19 case fatality rate in the context of healthcare system organization and EHCI performance: Focus on the Visegrad (V4) countries

2021

AOecon

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This article tries to explain the differences in COVID-19 case fatality rate (CFR) in 22 European countries by their type of organization and performance level of their healthcare systems. The CFR is taken here as the most important indicator since it measures the ratio between COVID deaths and COVID cases. In our view, this indicator reflects the true performance of the healthcare system, as this indicator is freed form public health interventions, like testing, lockdowns or social distancing. Our research is also unique, because it sees the healthcare system in a holistic way and tries to explain the CFR not by individual risk factors, socioeconomic indicators, or partial system parameters, but by using a complex healthcare system classification method adopted from Isabelle Joumard and an overall healthcare system performance index adopted from European Health Consumer Index (EHCI). The main results are twofold. First, higher EHCI score is related to lower CFR. So, the countries are cumulated basically in two quadrants: High EHCI performers (score 790 and higher) with low CFR (below 1.93%) and low EHCI performers with high COVID CFR. Second, apart from Czech Republic, the V4 countries are not doing very well in fighting COVID. Hungary is the worst, not only from the V4 group, but the worst from the whole list of 22 European countries included in this research. Poland is doing better, but still is high above the median CFR. Slovakia was the second worst from the V4 group. Czech Republic is the best V4 performer and the only country with EHCI score lower than median and CFR also lower than the median.

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Cultural values predict national COVID-19 death rates

Cited by 6 publications

References 26 publications

Flexible societies excelled in saving lives in the first phase of the COVID-19 pandemic

Flexible societies excelled in saving lives in the first phase of the COVID-19 pandemic

Pandemic Parameters 2020-2021 by Socio-Cultural Groups of Countries - Applied Analysis

COVID-19 case fatality rate in the context of healthcare system organization and EHCI performance: Focus on the Visegrad (V4) countries

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