Effects of Social Cues on Biosecurity Compliance in Livestock Facilities: Evidence From Experimental Simulations

Trinity, Luke; Merrill, Scott C.; Clark, Eric M.; Koliba, Christopher; Zia, Asim; Bucini, Gabriela; Smith, J. J. B.

doi:10.3389/fvets.2020.00130

Cited by 14 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 58 publications

(70 reference statements)

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“…Human decision-making is influenced by a variety of sociopsychological factors (3,4), including how the risk of animal infection is communicated (5,6). Moreover, decision-making is decidedly heterogeneous and responses to the same information may differ dramatically between individuals (7).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Message Delivery Strategy Influences Willingness to Comply With Biosecurity

et al. 2021

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As the Covid-19 pandemic continues worldwide, it has become increasingly clear that effective communication of disease transmission risks associated with protective behaviors is essential, and that communication tactics are not ubiquitously and homogenously understood. Analogous to Covid-19, communicable diseases in the hog industry result in millions of animal deaths and in the United States costs hundreds of millions of dollars annually. Protective behaviors such as preventative biosecurity practices are implemented to reduce these costs. Yet even with the knowledge of the importance of biosecurity, these practices are not employed consistently. The efficacy of biosecurity practices relies on consistent implementation and is influenced by a variety of behavioral factors under the umbrella of human decision-making. Using an experimental game, we collected data to quantify how different messages that described the likelihood of a disease incursion would influence willingness to follow biosecurity practices. Here we show that graphical messages combined with linguistic phrases demarking infection risk levels are more effective for ensuring compliance with biosecurity practices, as contrasted with either simple linguistic phrases or graphical messages with numeric demarcation of risk levels. All three of these delivery methods appear to be more effective than using a simple numeric value to describe probability of infection. Situationally, we saw greater than a 3-fold increase in compliance by shifting message strategy without changing the infection risk, highlighting the importance of situational awareness and context when designing messages.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Message Delivery Strategy Influences Willingness to Comply With Biosecurity

et al. 2021

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“…Although several papers have been published from this game using a variety of other combinations of treatments (22,45), the specific results from an experiment testing different modalities of information display are displayed in Figure 4. Linguistic, numeric, and graphical messaging and higher threats of disease all lead to higher rates of compliance with biosecurity protocols at the operational level.…”

Section: Figurementioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing strategic, tactical, and operational decision-making and risk in a livestock production chain through experimental simulation platforms

Koliba

Merrill²,

Zia³

et al. 2022

Front. Vet. Sci.

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This paper provides a research summary of a series of serious games and simulations that form the basis of an experimental platform for the study of human decision-making and behavior associated with biosecurity across complex livestock production chains. This platform is the first of its kind to address the challenges associated with scaling micro-behavior of biosecurity decision-making to macro-patterns of disease spread across strategic, tactical and operational levels, capturing the roles that facility managers and front-line workers play in making biosecurity decisions under risk and uncertainty. Informational and incentive treatments are tested within each game and simulation. Behavioral theories are used to explain these findings. Results from serious games in the form of behavioral probability distributions are then used to simulate disease incidence and spread across a complex production chain, demonstrating how micro-level behaviors contribute to larger macro-level patterns. In the case of this study, the propensity to adopt micro-level biosecurity practices are applied to a network percolation disease spread model. By presenting the suite of companion models of behavior and disease spread we are able to capture scaling dynamics of complex systems, and in the process, better understand how individual behaviors impact whole systems.

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“…Computer-based serious games allow users to "experience" hypothetical scenarios without placing them in real decision-making situations, thus allowing for imposed conflict to incite a behavioral response. Serious gaming research has been applied to simulated disease outbreaks in livestock, and has exposed sharply irrational and boundedly rational behavior when participants were confronted with conflict and exposed to dynamic risk situations (21)(22)(23)(24)(25)(26). For example, willingness to invest in protective measures for the health of livestock was influenced by treatments that provided or withheld certain types of information (22,23).…”

Section: (Which Was Not Certified By Peer Review)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Understanding the impact of COVID-19 risk perceptions on mitigation behaviors: A mixed methods approach using survey instruments and serious games

Merrill

Nowak

Shrum

et al. 2022

Preprint

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COVID-19 risk mitigation behavior, including social distancing and mask wearing, was a principal factor influencing the spread of COVID-19. Yet this behavior, and its association with COVID-19 perceptions and beliefs, is poorly understood. Here we used a mixed methods approach combining serious game data with survey instruments to describe relationships between perceptions and behavior. Using a series of survey questions, participants were described along a spectrum denoting their perception of their susceptibility to COVID-19 associated with a list of activities. Afterwards, participants engaged with a serious game to examine behavioral responses to scenarios involving shopping at a grocery store and going to a park during simulated pandemic conditions. Messages describing the simulated infection risk were shown to drive many behavioral decisions. Another significant correlate, derived from survey results, was the participant’s perception of susceptibility associated with various activities for acquiring the COVID-19 infection. Individuals that perceived every day activities, such as grocery shopping, as unlikely to lead to a COVID-19 infection spent more time near others in the game-simulated grocery store environment compared to those that consider such activities as risky. Additionally, we found that participant behavior became increasingly risky as time progresses if they were lucky enough not to experience an infection. This reflects behavior observed in the United States and more broadly, possibly explains how people update their perception of the risk of activities. Overall, results show a link between perception and action with regards to COVID-19 and support the use of targeted risk messaging to influence behavior. Moreover, the link between reported real-world perceptions and game behavior suggest that serious games can be used as valuable tools to test policies, risk messaging and communication, with the goal of nudging individuals with varied and nuanced perceptions and belief sets towards behaviors that will reduce the impact of COVID-19.

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Effects of Social Cues on Biosecurity Compliance in Livestock Facilities: Evidence From Experimental Simulations

Cited by 14 publications

References 58 publications

Message Delivery Strategy Influences Willingness to Comply With Biosecurity

Message Delivery Strategy Influences Willingness to Comply With Biosecurity

Assessing strategic, tactical, and operational decision-making and risk in a livestock production chain through experimental simulation platforms

Understanding the impact of COVID-19 risk perceptions on mitigation behaviors: A mixed methods approach using survey instruments and serious games

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