Face-Saving Strategies Increase Self-Reported Non-Compliance with COVID-19 Preventive Measures: Experimental Evidence from 12 Countries

Abstract

Studies of citizens' compliance with COVID-19 preventive measures routinely rely on survey data. While essential, public health restrictions provide clear signals of what is socially desirable in this context, creating a potential source of response bias in selfreported measures of compliance. In this research, we examine whether the results of a face-saving-strategy that was recently proposed by Daoust et al. (2020) to loosen this constraint are generalizable across twelve countries, and whether the treatment effect varies across subgroups. Our findings show that the face-saving strategy is a very useful tool in every country included, increasing respondents' proclivity to report noncompliance by 9 to 16 percentage points. This effect holds for different subgroups based on gender, age and education. We conclude that the inclusion of this strategy should be the new standard for survey research that aims to provide crucial data on the current pandemic.

Citizens and the state during crisis: Public authority, private behaviour and the Covid‐19 pandemic in France

“…( 2020 ) find little to no evidence of bias in Germany and Denmark, respectively. Some scholars (Becher et al.m 2020 ; Daoust et al.m 2020 ; Munzert & Selb, 2020 ) have sought to diagnose and remedy the potential for under‐reporting of non‐compliance, if it indeed exists, with so‐called list experiments, face‐saving questions or different question formats. To the extent that it is a concern, it should primarily affect mean responses and intercepts, rather than slope estimates.…”