To Follow or Not to Follow: Social Norms and Civic Duty during a Pandemic

Bourgeois, Laura French; Harell, Allison; Stephenson, Laura B.

doi:10.1017/s0008423920000554

Cited by 30 publications

(30 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…In a setting where high-profile campaigns and media attention had created considerable levels of awareness of the app in the first place, providing additional information and appealing to the common good or even personal advantage did little to convince people to use the app. Our findings do not imply that we would expect information and arguments to also be unsuccessful in other contexts 25,26,34,35 . Rather, they indicate that monetary incentives can mobilize additional compliance when information and arguments fail or have plateaued.…”

Section: Discussioncontrasting

confidence: 84%

Tracking and promoting the usage of a COVID-19 contact tracing app

et al. 2021

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Section: Discussioncontrasting

confidence: 84%

Tracking and promoting the usage of a COVID-19 contact tracing app

et al. 2021

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“…Social norms could be extremely relevant for explaining and affecting behaviors during the current pandemic [9,32]. Goldberg et al [12] and Smith et al [33] find that an individual's perceptions about how many others abide by social distancing correlate with the individual's propensity to social distance herself, and the effect of social norms can be stronger on individuals lacking a sense of duty [34]. As people seek to conform or to imitate the behavior of others [13], news coverage of celebrities or political leaders failing to abide by, or criticizing, preventive behaviors [35,36] could in fact reduce public compliance with such behaviors, as they might be "normalizing" them in the eye of the public [37][38][39].…”

Section: Theoretical Backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Let’s (not) get together! The role of social norms on social distancing during COVID-19

et al. 2021

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While effective preventive measures against COVID-19 are now widely known, many individuals fail to adopt them. This article provides experimental evidence about one potentially important driver of compliance with social distancing: social norms. We asked each of 23,000 survey respondents in Mexico to predict how a fictional person would behave when faced with the choice about whether or not to attend a friend’s birthday gathering. Every respondent was randomly assigned to one of four social norms conditions. Expecting that other people would attend the gathering and/or believing that other people approved of attending the gathering both increased the predicted probability that the fictional character would attend the gathering by 25%, in comparison with a scenario where other people were not expected to attend nor to approve of attending. Our results speak to the potential effects of communication campaigns and media coverage of compliance with, and normative views about, COVID-19 preventive measures. They also suggest that policies aimed at modifying social norms or making existing ones salient could impact compliance.

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“…During this time, public health agencies and officials emerged as the de facto leaders and primary decision makers for setting evidence-based public health policies, practices, and norms. Daily updates from medical officers of health and other public health experts would set the course for how each jurisdiction would respond to COVID-19 and outline the public’s role in “flattening the curve.” Some early research suggests that Canadians listened to these messages and followed public health recommendations [ 3 ], and also stayed home, particularly in the early weeks of the pandemic, as demonstrated by decreases in the levels of people’s movements tracked through Google’s Community Mobility Reports [ 4 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Examining Tweet Content and Engagement of Canadian Public Health Agencies and Decision Makers During COVID-19: Mixed Methods Analysis

Slavik¹,

Buttle²,

Sturrock³

et al. 2021

J Med Internet Res

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Background Effective communication during a health crisis can ease public concerns and promote the adoption of important risk-mitigating behaviors. Public health agencies and leaders have served as the primary communicators of information related to COVID-19, and a key part of their public outreach has taken place on social media platforms. Objective This study examined the content and engagement of COVID-19 tweets authored by Canadian public health agencies and decision makers. We propose ways for public health accounts to adjust their tweeting practices during public health crises to improve risk communication and maximize engagement. Methods We retrieved data from tweets by Canadian public health agencies and decision makers from January 1, 2020, to June 30, 2020. The Twitter accounts were categorized as belonging to either a public health agency, regional or local health department, provincial health authority, medical health officer, or minister of health. We analyzed trends in COVID-19 tweet engagement and conducted a content analysis on a stratified random sample of 485 tweets to examine the message functions and risk communication strategies used by each account type. Results We analyzed 32,737 tweets authored by 118 Canadian public health Twitter accounts, of which 6982 tweets were related to COVID-19. Medical health officers authored the largest percentage of COVID-19–related tweets (n=1337, 35%) relative to their total number of tweets and averaged the highest number of retweets per COVID-19 tweet (112 retweets per tweet). Public health agencies had the highest frequency of daily tweets about COVID-19 throughout the study period. Compared to tweets containing media and user mentions, hashtags and URLs were used in tweets more frequently by all account types, appearing in 69% (n=4798 tweets) and 68% (n=4781 tweets) of COVID-19–related tweets, respectively. Tweets containing hashtags also received the highest average retweets (47 retweets per tweet). Our content analysis revealed that of the three tweet message functions analyzed (information, action, community), tweets providing information were the most commonly used across most account types, constituting 39% (n=181) of all tweets; however, tweets promoting actions from users received higher than average retweets (55 retweets per tweet). When examining tweets that received one or more retweet (n=359), the difference between mean retweets across the message functions was statistically significant (P<.001). The risk communication strategies that we examined were not widely used by any account type, appearing in only 262 out of 485 tweets. However, when these strategies were used, these tweets received more retweets compared to tweets that did not use any risk communication strategies (P<.001) (61 retweets versus 13 retweets on average). Conclusions Public health agencies and decision makers should examine what messaging best meets the needs of their Twitter audiences to maximize sharing of their communications. Public health accounts that do not currently employ risk communication strategies in their tweets may be missing an important opportunity to engage with users about the mitigation of health risks related to COVID-19.

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To Follow or Not to Follow: Social Norms and Civic Duty during a Pandemic

Cited by 30 publications

References 11 publications

Tracking and promoting the usage of a COVID-19 contact tracing app

Tracking and promoting the usage of a COVID-19 contact tracing app

Let’s (not) get together! The role of social norms on social distancing during COVID-19

Examining Tweet Content and Engagement of Canadian Public Health Agencies and Decision Makers During COVID-19: Mixed Methods Analysis

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