Changes in social norms during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic across 43 countries

The emergence of COVID-19 dramatically changed social behavior across societies and contexts. Here we study whether social norms also changed. Specifically, we study this question for cultural tightness (the degree to which societies generally have strong norms), specific social norms (e.g. stealing, hand washing), and norms about enforcement, using survey data from 30,431 respondents in 43 countries recorded before and in the early stages following the emergence of COVID-19. Using variation in disease intensity, we shed light on the mechanisms predicting changes in social norm measures. We find evidence that, after the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, hand washing norms increased while tightness and punishing frequency slightly decreased; but observe no robust change in other norms. Thus, at least in the short term, our findings suggest that cultures are largely stable to pandemic threats except in those norms, hand washing in this case, that are perceived to be directly relevant to dealing with the collective threat.

Giulia Andrighetto, Eron Székely, Andrea Guido, Michele Gelfand, Jerd Abernathy, Eugen Arikan, Elizaveta Berezina, Shweta Bankar, Davide Barrera, Dana Bashnigt-Brown, Anabel Belaus, S. J. Arash N. Grigoryan, Katarzyna Gwoździewicz, Hirofumi Hashimoto, Tim Hopthrow, Martina Hrebíčková, Soniha Kapoor, Yoshiki Kashima, Marinu Tkachuk, Sadek M. Ait Hmida, Pawan Maridil, Ekaterina McArdle, Michael Tibbetts, Maria Luisa Mendes Teixeira, Zdenka Mlejnková, Francesca L. Nitti, Esteban P. Oliva, Neoma G. Onyedir, Ike I. Onyedikachi, Evgeny Onisin, Seinha Oden, Penny Panagiotopoulou, Oleskandr Pereyra-Florio, Lorena R. Pérez-Florio, Mariana Piryatinskaya, Janna Rave, Eskiya Reyna, Ricardo B. Ramos Rodrigues, Sara Romani, Pedro P. Romero, Harek Sakiḱ, Angel Sánchez, Sara Hrelja, Brett Simpson, Lorenzo Spadon, Etychita Stankova, Giovanni A. Travaglio, Paul A. Van Lange, Fiona Rita Marvila, Rijaya Amelia Zen, Qing-Zheng Zhang, Martin Erikson