HOME News & Events Events archive On-line for CiNet members (Sign-up required): Shuhei Kitamura: “Social Comparisons and Cooperation during COVID-19”

On-line for CiNet members (Sign-up required): Shuhei Kitamura: “Social Comparisons and Cooperation during COVID-19”

Friday Lunch Seminar

March 5, 2021
12:15 〜 13:00
(On-line for CiNet members only)

Talk Title: “Social Comparisons and Cooperation during COVID-19”

Shuhei Kitamura
Associate Professor
Osaka School of International Public Policy
Osaka University

Host PI: Aya Ihara

Abstract:
We conducted a randomized survey experiment during the COVID-19 pandemic to examine the effects of information treatments on individuals’ cooperation with social dstancing measures.
Using a 2 by 2 factorial design, we examined the effects of social comparisons and a powerful messenger. Based on a sample of about 3,000 respondents, we found that our subjects cooperated with social distancing measures more when they understood they had spent a relatively long time outside the home compared with the social norms in the previous week. By contrast, we found no evidence that a powerful messenger increases the effectiveness of the message.