North Carolina has seen new records of COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations this winter despite the public health guidelines in place. While science shows wearing masks prevents the virus from spreading, not everyone has chosen to comply. While vaccines to the virus are in the earliest stages of distribution, elected officials have urged people to continue wearing masks as trends continue to worsen.
Dan Ariely is a professor of psychology and behavioral economics at Duke University. He studies the ways people behave irrationally to design ways to change human behavior to become more reasonable.
During a recent panel hosted by the university, Ariely described the coronavirus pandemic as a tragedy, partially because it is perpetuated by individualism.
“Things like COVID-19 are a public good problem,” he said. “If I think about my role and contributing to the public good, then I would act very differently [than if I only thought about myself.] This is why social norms are so important. If people basically both reinforce us in a positive and a negative way, if it’s something in the environment…we would act very differently.”
This mentality applies to those who choose not to wear masks despite the benefit to the health of those around them, said Ariely. He said individual experiences often drive people’s actions and if someone has not been directly impacted by the illness COVID-19 sometimes causes, it’s more challenging to become invested in stopping it.
The professor said there are many who base their decisions on day-to-day experiences that might never be infected with the coronavirus, causing a false perspective that all people are safe.
“Imagine you think,” Ariely described, “the probability of texting when driving and [it leading to] something bad happening is 1%. One day, you drive and text, but nothing happens. What you do at the end of this is update your belief and you say, ‘maybe it’s not 1%, maybe it’s 0.75%.’ And you are more likely to do it [again.]”
Ariely said COVID-19 is a similar experience for people who choose not to wear masks but have not caught the virus. He likened going out one day without wearing a mask to texting and driving, saying those who view the pandemic on an individual level learn the wrong lessons through their own actions.
“We can’t hope that people’s experience will teach them that [wearing masks] is a good idea,” Ariely said. “What we need instead is social understanding that this is the right behavior. We need people to say to each other ‘thank you for wearing a mask’ or ‘I’m sorry, I don’t feel comfortable, would you put your mask on?’ It has to be friendly enforcement of everything we do about the act of not wearing your mask and not about the fear of catching it.”
Ariely said one method of reinforcement is leading by example. He said those in prominent positions, like federal elected officials, could provide clear examples to people who don’t regularly practice following public health guidelines or are confused.
“What we need is not just people to tell us what to do, but to show us how to do it,” said Ariely. “Masks and social distancing are not easy to figure out. How do you do social distancing when [around family] and can we get help by seeing people who are doing it right way? We need to see examples of the little details of how they do it in their lives, and then I think there will be higher compliance.”
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