Misrepresentation and Nonadherence Regarding COVID-19 Public Health Measures

Abstract

ImportanceThe effectiveness of public health measures implemented to mitigate the spread and impact of SARS-CoV-2 relies heavily on honesty and adherence from the general public.ObjectiveTo examine the frequency of, reasons for, and factors associated with misrepresentation and nonadherence regarding COVID-19 public health measures.Design, Setting, and ParticipantsThis survey study recruited a national, nonprobability sample of US adults to participate in an online survey using Qualtrics online panels (participation rate, 1811 of 2260 [80.1%]) from December 8 to 23, 2021. The survey contained screening questions to allow for a targeted sample of one-third who had had COVID-19, one-third who had not had COVID-19 and were vaccinated, and one-third who had not had COVID-19 and were unvaccinated.Main Outcomes and MeasuresThe survey assessed 9 different types of misrepresentation and nonadherence related to COVID-19 public health measures and the reasons underlying such behaviors. Additional questions measured COVID-19–related beliefs and behaviors and demographic characteristics.ResultsThe final sample included 1733 participants. The mean (SD) participant age was 41 (15) years and the sample predominantly identified as female (1143 of 1732 [66.0%]) and non-Hispanic White (1151 of 1733 [66.4%]). Seven hundred twenty-one participants (41.6%) reported misrepresentation and/or nonadherence in at least 1 of the 9 items; telling someone they were with or about to be with in person that they were taking more COVID-19 preventive measures than they actually were (420 of 1726 [24.3%]) and breaking quarantine rules (190 of 845 [22.5%]) were the most common manifestations. The most commonly endorsed reasons included wanting life to feel normal and wanting to exercise personal freedom. All age groups younger than 60 years (eg, odds ratio for those aged 18-29 years, 4.87 [95% CI, 3.27-7.34]) and those who had greater distrust in science (odds ratio, 1.14 [95% CI, 1.05-1.23]) had significantly higher odds of misrepresentation and/or nonadherence for at least 1 of the 9 items.Conclusions and RelevanceIn this survey study of US adults, nearly half of participants reported misrepresentation and/or nonadherence regarding public health measures against COVID-19. Future work is needed to examine strategies for communicating the consequences of misrepresentation and nonadherence and to address contributing factors.

Parental Nonadherence to Health Policy Recommendations for Prevention of COVID-19 Transmission Among Children

“…Additional methodological information is published elsewhere. 3 The University of Utah Institutional Review Board deemed the study exempt and granted a waiver of informed consent owing to no risk or minimal risk to participants. The study followed the AAPOR reporting guideline.…”

“…People are not always honest about their medical information 1 or adherent to medical recommendations, 2 including the public health measures (PHMs) against COVID-19 (eg, not reporting symptoms, breaking quarantine). 3 During the COVID-19 pandemic, parents experienced greater increases in stress compared with nonparents due to additional child-related PHMs (eg, school closings, quarantine rules for children). 4 We examined the prevalence of misrepresentations of and nonadherence to COVID-19–related PHMs by parents regarding their children (eg, breaking quarantine rules by sending their child to school so that the parent can work), their reasons, and associations of individual characteristics with these behaviors.…”

COVID-19 infection and ambulatory surgery: Decision making based on known knowns

“…If Levy’s conclusions are generalizable, healthy skepticism should be applied when reviewing preoperative screening questionnaires that are widely used by surgical facilities and procedural offices. 14 …”

A Bayesian decision-theoretic framework for studying motivated reasoning

“…Their assessment of the evidence is not inaccurate (the evidence is unclear), but there is utility in forming a belief report that's party-compatible, so their belief report is in line with the perceived utility of holding this belief (see Cialdini et al, 1991;Kahan & Braman, 2006;Sunstein, 2000). There is experimental evidence this occurs: people see utilities in forming beliefs, and anticipate the consequences of those beliefs (Falk & Zimmermann, 2016;Golman & Loewenstein, 2018;Jachimowicz et al, 2018;Levy et al, 2022).…”

“…One possible explanation of this rejection is that accepting the reality of human-caused climate change would entail radically changing how they must behave, an unwanted outcome. In turn-so the argument goesconservatives are motivated to reject or reinterpret evidence of human-caused climate change (for evidence this occurs in other domains, see Levy et al, 2022).…”