A new study finds that Americans take COVID-19 health precautions less seriously around their close friends, but that conservatives are likelier than liberals to relax them.
The online study found that U.S. residents from all political backgrounds engaged in fewer health precautions after finding out a friend may have been infected — even when they encountered the friend at an indoor restaurant.
The study was conducted by two marketing professors, and published this week in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied.
“Under such circumstances, study participants decided to purchase fewer health protection items, such as masks and hand sanitizers, and perceived less likelihood of infection, even when the infection risk could stem from strangers in crowds,” the study reported.
Conservatives proved especially likely to exhibit a “friend-shield effect,” the study reported.
In one experiment, the study asked participants in three groups to imagine going to a coffee shop either alone, with a friend or with an acquaintance.
Asked how busy they expected the coffee shop to be, self-identified conservatives who imagined going with a friend were likelier than conservatives in the other two groups to predict it would be “less crowded” with a lower risk of infection.
There was no similar result for liberals, whose answers stayed the same regardless of who went with them.
Researchers Hyunjung Crystal Lee and Eline De Vries, who both teach at the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid in Spain, said they hope public health officials will consider “tailoring messages” differently for conservatives in the future.
“This tendency that we call the ‘friend-shield effect’ could intensify a false sense of safety and contribute to future infections,” Ms. Lee said.
The researchers found conservatives tend to have “clearer boundaries” between close friends and people they do not know well.
Psychologist John T. Jost, author of “Left & Right: The Psychological Significance of a Political Distinction,” said the study confirms his research that shows “relational motivation” differs for conservatives than for liberals.
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That includes the fact that conservatives tend to score higher in psychological tests on their desire to share a sense of reality with like-minded others, including friends and family members.
“That, in conjunction with the fact that conservatives have been more suspicious than liberals of medical experts from [Dr. Anthony] Fauci on down throughout the entire pandemic, could help to explain the phenomenon,” said Mr. Jost, a professor of psychology and politics at New York University.
The study published this week was based on experiments the researchers conducted from April 2020 to February 2021, primarily during the heaviest lockdown periods.
Another experiment in the study asked participants how much they planned to spend on personal protective items over the next two months.
Those who imagined infection by a friend planned to spend less than half as much on health protection items ($9.28 on average) than those who imagined infection by an acquaintance ($18.84) or a stranger ($21.36).
The study noted that many Americans have spent more time with their closest social circles during the past two years of COVID-19 lockdowns, leading them to be less careful around friends.
But Harry T. Reis, a professor of psychology at the University of Rochester, said the “friend-shield effect” is strong even in normal times.
“People trust their friends more than they trust strangers in all kinds of ways, so it is entirely natural to assume that friends are likely to be less of a risk than strangers,” Mr. Reis said.
For more information, visit The Washington Times COVID-19 resource page.
• Sean Salai can be reached at ssalai@washingtontimes.com.
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