Research by Bavel et al. (2020), in plain language
What’s this paper about?
This paper looks at things that stop us from acting together against COVID, and what we can do to handle the situation better.
Why did they write this paper?
The COVID-19 pandemic is a crisis we all face. Until a vaccine is available, we need to act together to handle the situation. But, many things make a difference to how we act under the stress of a crisis and how well we act together. In this paper, the researchers wanted to make science-based recommendations for how we can act together against COVID. The researchers wrote this paper in April, within a month of the pandemic being declared.
How did they write this paper?
The researchers looked at existing research on the topics of:
Threat perception, which relates to how we sense and react to danger.
Social context, which relates to how society is set up.
Science communication, which relates to how scientific information is spread.
Individual and collective interests, which relates to how we weigh up our own versus others’ interests.
Leadership, which relates to how leaders help others do the right thing.
Stress and coping, which relates to how we handle hardships.
Based on this evidence, the researchers discuss how we could encourage helpful actions and prevent unhelpful actions in handling COVID.
What did they discuss in this paper?
(continued from part 1)
Science communication
Conspiracy theories
‘China created COVID as a bioweapon against the US’ is only one among many conspiracy theories surrounding COVID. We often feel the need to explain dramatic events with dramatic causes, but conspiracies are dangerous because they can lead to things like anti-vaxxing, denial of climate change, extreme political views, and unfair treatment of others. COVID conspiracies could lead people to ignore official health advice for treating symptoms and instead try dodgy, or even deadly, alternatives. They can also put people in a bad frame of mind towards certain groups seen as to blame for the disease. We’re less likely to fall for conspiracies if we see facts first – that’s why fact-based news is so important.
Fake news
Social media is rife with fake news and this, too, is dangerous. One way to stop fake news spreading is to ‘debunk’ unreliable information. Debunking works best when we see an expert involved, political views that match our own, denial being pointed out, and explanations of why the unreliable claims are untrue.
Another way to stop fake news spreading is to ‘prebunk’. This works like a vaccine, where a small dose of disease is used to trigger our immune system so that we have our defences ready for when we’re actually sick. Prebunking uses a small dose of fake news, in a made up scenario, to make us less gullible for when we see actual fake news. Check out this online game which does exactly that: www.getbadnews.com.
Persuasion
Where a message comes from and how it’s delivered makes a difference to how motivated we are to take action. For instance, when the Ebola crisis broke out, having important messages come from religious leaders worked well because they were seen by the people as a trustworthy source. Messages delivered in a way that shows how certain actions would benefit us, protect others, be “right”, or be “normal” (according to our ideas of right and normal) also work better in getting us to take action.
Individual and collective interests
Zero-sum thinking
Our ingrained way of thinking that someone else “winning” equals us “losing”, and vice versa, doesn’t hold true for infectious disease. Someone else losing only puts all of us at greater risk of getting infected, so trying to win by hoarding things like masks and hand sanitiser would be self-defeating. In contrast, making sure everyone else is winning would be a win for us too.
In saying that, treating infection does have an element of winning and losing. When there aren’t enough hospital beds, ventilators, and doctors to go around, doctors have no choice but to make brutal but practical decisions about who gets treated and who doesn’t. If we see a person making brutal decisions, even if they’re practical, we tend to trust them less, so it might be best to have these life-and-death decisions be seen as made by the government rather than doctors themselves.
Moral decision-making
In a pandemic, it’s hard to decide for sure what’s “right” and “wrong”. We tend to be more willing to make sacrifices (e.g. avoid social contact) when we think about the worst case scenario (e.g. making someone seriously ill). We also tend to not want to be judged by others for our decisions. The thing is, doing wrong by doing something is judged more than doing wrong by not doing anything. And, doing wrong by doing something different to what’s “normal” is judged more than doing what’s normal. So, if not doing anything different in our day-to-day to stop the spread of COVID was framed as doing something different to what’s normal, it would make it more wrong.
Cooperation
It’s hard to make sacrifices for others especially when what’s best for us now is traded for what would benefit others in the future. Having penalties and rewards, and drawing attention to what’s “right” or “wrong” for certain actions, are ways of getting people to work together. We’re also more likely to work together if we’re under the impression that others are working together, which is why it would be helpful for the news to show this type of thing.
Leadership
Trust and compliance
Trust is very important in getting people to do what they’re told. For instance, during the Ebola outbreak, it made a big difference when health officials went door-to-door to speak to people and gain their trust. In the same way, we’d be more likely to do what we’re told by the government if they got leaders in our own community to spread the message.
Identity leadership
A leader needs to create a sense of being ‘one’ as a whole. We’re more willing to follow leaders we see as one of us, and as doing things for all our best interest, rather than leaders we see as being on a different level as us, or as not wanting to share the burden.
In-group elevation
A good thing for leaders to do is to lead by example, because having good role models motivates us to do the right thing. That’s why it’s important for people like politicians, celebrities, and community leaders to do the right thing. Looking too good, though, can be a bad thing. Saying the country is doing an excellent job of handling the situation if they aren’t can actually lead to something called ‘collective narcissism’. This makes people more focused on making sure the country “looks good” than in actually helping its people. Collective narcissism also ties in with seeing “outsiders” as a threat and blaming them for bad things that happen to the group.
Stress and coping
Social isolation and connection
Social distancing can be helpful for the pandemic but harmful for our wellbeing. As humans, being connected helps us cope with stress, and being lonely harms us in our mental health, heart health, and immune health. But, being lonely (a feeling of not being connected) is different to being alone (a state of being isolated). Calling it ‘physical distancing’, not social distancing, can show that we can still be connected while being isolated. Connecting online in more depth, with back and forth, and in real-time – not mindless scrolling – can make us feel better, and it’s important to make sure everyone can use the technology to stay connected in this way.
Intimate relationships
With the stress of the pandemic, it’s easy to take things out on people close to us. One way to avoid this is to adjust our expectations to match the situation. This will look different for every relationship, but it means lowering overall expectations that everything will run smoothly, and keeping high expectations for smaller things that are still possible during COVID.
Healthy mindsets
We can’t not feel stressed in a pandemic, but we can change the way we think about stress. Thinking about stress as a chance to grow can actually make us stronger, change our priorities, go deeper in our relationships, and appreciate life more. We can do this by thinking about stress not as something that’s dangerous, but as something that shows we care.
What are the take home messages?
If you made it this far, bravo. There’s no more I have the energy to say about this right now, because it’s 2020 and we’re in a pandemic.
Where can I learn more?
This blog post is based on the following paper:
Bavel, J. J. V., Baicker, K., Boggio, P. S., Capraro, V., Cichocka, A., Cikara, M., . . . Willer, R. (2020). Using social and behavioural science to support COVID-19 pandemic response. Nat Hum Behav, 4(5), 460-471. doi:10.1038/s41562-020-0884-z
You can read the original paper here: