Racial/Ethnic Differences in Prosocial Beliefs and Prevention Behavior During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Controlling the COVID-19 pandemic has required communities to engage in prosocial action, including behaviors that may inconvenience individuals, but protect the collective (e.g., mask wearing, social distancing). The purpose of this study was to understand to what extent COVID-19 prosocial beliefs and behavior differ by race/ethnicity and why this might be the case. A US nationally representative sample of 410 adults completed a survey about COVID-19 beliefs and prevention behaviors between June 12 and 18, 2020. Compared to White respondents, Black respondents perceived the risk of COVID-19 to be greater to the US population; and both Black and Latinx respondents thought it was more important to protect a variety of non-close others (e.g., people in their city or state). Black and Latinx respondents engaged in several prevention behaviors, including social distancing, to a greater extent than White respondents. There were indirect effects of Black vs. White race on engaging in protective behaviors through greater perceived risk to others and beliefs in the importance of protecting distal others. Results indicate that targeted messages promoting prevention, including vaccination with pro-social messages, may resonate with communities of color. They also suggest that lower levels of prosocial beliefs among White people have likely hindered the US response to the epidemic.

Perceived COVID-19 threat, perceived healthcare system inequities, personal experiences of healthcare discrimination and their associations with COVID-19 preventive behavioral intentions among college students in the U.S.

“…Consistent with prior explanations from these national surveys [ 41 , 47 ], the racial/ethnic differences in Latent Class 1 membership and higher intentions for Latent Class 1 to engage in COVID-19 preventive behaviors may be partially explained by higher perceived COVID-19 threat among students from minoritized racial/ethnic groups and lower perceived threat among Non-Hispanic White students. As noted in previous literature, one key takeaway from these findings may be a need to emphasize the importance of COVID-19 preventive behaviors among those with lower perceived COVID-19 threat.…”

“…These perceptions may be partially attributed to discussions of structural racism on university and college campuses, which increased on campuses across the country in 2020 [ 40 ] and may suggest perceptions of racial/ethnic inequities in the healthcare system are higher among college students compared to the general adult population. Lastly, students’ probability of experiencing personal healthcare discrimination varied across latent classes which reflects the literature on healthcare discrimination in the general adult population [ 41 ]. Responses to the latent class indicators suggest that college students may vary in their individual risk perceptions (i.e., perceived severity and susceptibility to illness) as well as perceptions of the healthcare system.…”

“…Students in Latent Class 1 had higher intentions to social distance compared to students in all other latent classes and higher intentions to wear a mask and receive the COVID-19 vaccine compared to students in Latent Classes 2 and 3. Given that students in Latent Class 1 were more likely to belong to one of the minoritized racial/ethnic groups compared to the Non-Hispanic White group, their intentions to engage in COVID-19 preventive behaviors are partially reflective of recent national surveys of U.S. adults (i.e., Black and Latinx adults were more likely to social distance [ 41 ] and Black and Latinx males and females and Asian males were more likely to wear masks than White respondents [ 47 ]).…”

Racial Disparities in the Perceived Risk of COVID-19 and in Getting Needed Medical Care

“…Thus, one must consider a wide spectrum of policies to address these perceived gaps during the pandemic. Orom et al [ 25 ] find that Black and Latinx people respond positively to pro-social policies—that is, “this policy (such as masks) will be good not just for you but for others.” Pro-social policies do not resonant as much with White people [ 25 ]. At the other end of the spectrum are bias-reducing educational programs, such as the implicit bias training for healthcare providers proposed in the 2021 Senate Bill S.1234 (The Maternal CARE Act) to help mitigate the racial disparities in maternal mortality and morbidity [ 38 ].…”

“…While three recent surveys (the American Trends Panel survey, the Diffusion of Fear survey, and a survey from the Ipsos Knowledge Panel) have examined race and perceptions of COVID-19 risks, their survey questions were limited to general health concerns, such as the impact of COVID-19 on the “population’s health” [ 24 , 25 ]. These general measures are difficult to use to parse out disparities in fears of infection, death, hospitalization, and access to care.…”