The impact of COVID‐19 and political identification on framing bias in an infectious disease experiment: The frame reigns supreme

Abstract

Background Behavioral responses to the COVID‐19 pandemic have become highly polarized, and public health initiatives often try to use different frames to influence behavior. If the polarization of behaviors is related to differences in responses to frames, then different health messages could be targeted to different groups to influence behavior. Objective To determine whether risk preferences and susceptibility to gain/loss frames have been affected by COVID‐19 and whether they differ along partisan lines. Methods Using repeated cross‐sectional data from a nationally representative dataset in the United States replicating the disease outbreak scenario collected before and after the onset of COVID‐19, we test whether responsiveness to the gain/loss frames has changed over time and whether the responsiveness varies by political affiliation. Results The experimental results show that the risk preferences of the U.S. population is very susceptible to the framing of choices, consistent with the literature finding risk loving preferences under the loss frame and risk aversion under the gain frame. However, the experience of COVID‐19 does not appear to have changed the responsiveness, nor are there significant differences between conservatives/Republicans and liberals/Democrats. Conclusion Targeting different partisan groups with different risk‐related message frames is unlikely to be effective at altering behaviors.