The Social Lives of Infectious Diseases: Why Culture Matters to COVID-19

Abstract

Over the course of the year 2020, the global scientific community dedicated considerable effort to understanding COVID-19. In this review, we discuss some of the findings accumulated between the onset of the pandemic and the end of 2020, and argue that although COVID-19 is clearly a biological disease tied to a specific virus, the culture–mind relation at the heart of cultural psychology is nonetheless essential to understanding the pandemic. Striking differences have been observed in terms of relative mortality, transmission rates, behavioral responses, official policies, compliance with authorities, and even the extent to which beliefs about COVID-19 have been politicized across different societies and groups. Moreover, many minority groups have very different experiences of the pandemic relative to dominant groups, notably through existing health inequities as well as discrimination and marginalization, which we believe calls for a better integration of political and socioeconomic factors into cultural psychology and into the narrative of health and illness in psychological science more broadly. Finally, individual differences in, for example, intolerance of uncertainty, optimism, conspiratorial thinking, or collectivist orientation are influenced by cultural context, with implications for behaviors that are relevant to the spread and impact of COVID-19, such as mask-wearing and social distancing. The interplay between cultural context and the experience and expression of mental disorders continues to be documented by cultural-clinical psychology; the current work extends this thinking to infectious disease, with special attention to diseases spread by social contact and fought at least in part through social interventions. We will discuss cultural influences on the transmission, course, and outcome of COVID-19 at three levels: (1) cross-society differences; (2) within-society communities and intergroup relations; and (3) individual differences shaped by cultural context. We conclude by considering potential theoretical implications of this perspective on infectious disease for cultural psychology and related disciplines, as well as practical implications of this perspective on science communication and public health interventions.

Wastewater surveillance beyond COVID-19: a ranking system for communicable disease testing in the tri-county Detroit area, Michigan, USA

“…Differences in incidence among CDs in the TCDA vs. the state of Michigan demonstrate epidemiological trends that differ, possibly due to population density, wildlife/ecology, climate, socioeconomic and racial inequities, cultural or behavioral differences, age distribution, and access to healthcare and/or medical insurance (170)(171)(172)(173)(174). The ranking system results focus on TCDA which is an urban area with high-density population.…”

Language and the cultural markers of COVID-19

“…Finally, culture also influences preferences regarding the physical distance that people keep when interacting with others, and recent literature suggests that individuals with Southern European cultural origins are accustomed to relatively closer interactions ( Sorokowska et al (2017) ). Bayeh et al (2021) discusses how individual differences shaped by cultural context, for example, intolerance of uncertainty, optimism, conspiratorial thinking, or collectivist orientation have implications for behaviours that are relevant to the spread and impact of COVID-19, such as mask-wearing and social distancing. Note that despite being one of the wealthiest countries in the world, Switzerland has one of the lowest COVID-19 vaccination rates in Europe.…”

Genetic and Psycho-social Values, Perspective Among Akans on Marriage

“…According to traditional beliefs, illnesses are said to be brought on by attacks from evil or negative spirits, and humans may contract a sickness as retribution for treating their ancestors poorly [26] . Cultural-clinical psychology has continued to document the interaction between the experience of cultural context and the manifestation of mental disorders; the work of [10] extends this thinking to infectious disease, with a focus on illnesses that are spread through social contact and are at least in part treated through social interventions.…”