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Pandemic health measures compliance

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5. Why do some people comply with public health measures (such as wearing a mask)

during a pandemic, while others do not? Draw on psychological and/or sociological

literature to support your answer.

Introduction

Pandemics have been existing in this world since creation. Even though they tend not to

happen frequently, pandemics still threaten the existence of humanity on the planet earth. There

are many theories both scientifically and biblically trying to explaining the reasons why we face

pandemics but no one has managed to give a proper reason to why they happen. Pandemics

comes in form of viruses that are infectious either from one person to another, from one animal

to another or from animals to human beings and vice versa. The most famous pandemics that

have been experienced in the world are Spanish flu and Covid-19. During the pandemics there

are specific measures and regulations that are put in place to curb the spread of the virus. Each

country comes with its specific measures to protect her people. The best example of a pandemic

that has seen the world come to a standstill is Covid-19. During this time, we have seen different

countries with rules and measures like total lockdown, partial lockdown, social distancing and

mandatory use of face masks. Despite having all these measures, not everyone is willing to

observe them for their own personal reasons

This paper sis going to discuss why some people observe rules like wearing face masks,

social distancing and avoiding social gathering while others refuse to follow the same rules. To

achieve this, theories like theory of planned behavior and expanding protection motivation

theory. At the end of this article, all the above questions will have been answered.
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Theory of Planned Behavior

Icek Ajzen developed the Theory of Planned Behavior with an aim of predicting the

behavior of humans. This theory aims at looking at the attitude toward the behavior, subjective

norm and the perceived behavioral control influence. Ajzen (1991), takes the behavioral

intention as the first construct of the theory, which are the factors of motivation influencing one’s

behavior. Secondly, he takes attitude towards behavior as the second construct of the theory to

determine to what extend a person can have favorable or unfavorable appraisal of a certain given

behavior. Behavioral believes and outcome evaluations are what is consisted in the attitude. The

third construct of the theory is the subjective norm whereby it is the social pressure to either

perform or not perform a given behavior. According to Asare (2015) another factor that plays a

role on the perception of people towards either to feel easy to perform or difficulty to perform a

given behavior of interest is the perceived behavioral control.

The theory of planned behavior can easily be applied in public health practice. Public

health officers see people addicted to a certain behavior. It is very hard to change the habit of an

individual. Sometimes it is important to make people understand the effects of their behaviors.

For example during this covid-19 period, people find it hard to avoid shaking of hands because

for a long time it has been their norm to shake each other’s hands. Coming out of this norm

requires a lot of sensitization. Some people will just refuse to observe simple rules because they

feel that is what they have been doing for a long time and therefore they might not look at what

will happen to them but rather stick to what they feel is better for them (Sadique et. al., 2007)

Public health practitioners can offer civic education and programs to help change these

behavior even though it is subjective if a person can decide to change his/her lifestyle and habits.

With proper help the public can overcome this kind of behavior and strive for a better health and
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lifestyle by making choices that are not dangerous. However, personal choices, beliefs and how

the public perceive the situation plays a big role in the theory of planned behavior. Their attitude

towards overcoming a given situation should always be positive.

The theory of planned behavior is something that is practiced in every day’s life without

realizing it. In most cases people make choices in based on how they view things, their beliefs

and the rewards they get from the choices they make every day. For example, people may choose

to wear masks because they believe they are vulnerable to infection while others believe that

they are immune to the virus and finally others will feel there is no virus.

Why some people resist to follow advice during pandemics

Politicized collective Identity

Most people will resist to follow advice during pandemics because of politicized

collective identity. Melucci (1985: 793) defines collective identity as an interactive, shared

definition of the field of opportunities and constraints offered to collective action produced by

several individuals .Citizens from various countries have protested various measures that have

been put in place by their respective governments. For example people feel that putting on a

mask attaches them to a certain group. Therefore, they will refuse to comply with some measure

just to make sure that they reaming affiliated to a certain group. Compliance of pandemic rules

has now become us versus them. People want to be seen as members of a certain group and

therefore they resist to follow the set measures during the pandemics. In most cases people will

refuse to follow rules because they fell the person who came up with the rules does not belong to

them and therefore if they followed those rules it will mean that they are willing to identify

themselves with the other person who is their enemy. According to Turner et al. (1979, 1987),
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social categorization whereby one case her/himself in a group that is similar to some people and

different from other people is very important in the context of radicalization because social

categorization is an important factor in creation of social environment in terms of groups and

helps people know their place in the society.

In the United States, wearing masks has been associated with politics and therefore

wearing a mask is no longer associated with public health precautions. Currently, wearing a

mask in the United States is a political statement that tells where your affiliation is. For example,

in the US some people do not want to wear mask because they do not like a certain presidential

aspirant. Probably maybe the aspirant said he will make it mandatory for people to wear masks

once elected. This kind of attitude makes people to make choices that go against the set rules of

curbing the pandemic thus making it hard for the government to manage and implement the set

out rules.

Reasons why some people observe rules during pandemics

Knowledge and trust

When the population has increased knowledge in regard to the pandemic there is

likelihood that people will adhere to the preventive measures. People make decisions based on

what they know and how what they know will affect them. According to zhong (2020) attributed

the adherence of citizens to the level of knowledge and awareness they have in regard to the

covid-19 pandemic. Lack of proper knowledge leads to unconcerned attitudes and adherence

leads to a situation where it hard to control and implement the set out measures. A population

with no knowledge about the pandemic will always remain ignorant and they will see no reason

to follow the set out measures (Brewer, 1991). For example, an informed person will know how
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social distancing is useful in controlling of the spread of the virus. Furthermore, someone with

knowledge will understand why it is a must to wash hands, wear mask and sanitize hands before

touching or eating anything.

According to protection motivation theory suggest that the public will choose to adopt

protective measures depending on the high risk of perception because it has influence on the

intention of the general public. when people make sound decisions about their health they look at

the cost of the perceptions and the benefits of the choices they will make both on individual level

and the society as a whole (Fischhoff, 2013). . In the times of pandemics, sources of

information such as health agencies, government, professionals in the public health and the

media can pass information to the public on the threat of the pandemic. Receiving such

information from different sources can affect the knowledge of the public in regard to their

perceived risk and therefore influencing their decision to adhering to protective measures (smith

et al, 2006). It is therefore important to understand how the public will perceive and trust the

information that comes from different sources in regard to the risk. The willingness to comply

will depend on where the information about the pandemic has come from (Lau et.al.2007)

Citizens will always adhere to the rules because they feel they trust the source of

information about the pandemic. For instance, people wear masks because World Health

organization passed an information that the virus can spread from one person to another through

air. Moreover, people observe social distancing protective measures because they trust the

information from the World Health Organization (2020) that the virus can spread through body

contact. According to Kristiansen et.al. (2007) perception of the pandemic and individual

precaution is what drives people toward complying with the pandemic rules.
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Conclusion

World has been experiencing pandemics after a certain period of time and all this time no

one has ever come up with proper solution to mitigate the effects apart from mere measures to be

observed by people. This paper has managed to discuss two important things based on the reason

to why some people comply with measures during pandemics while others not. For the reason to

why people comply, this paper found out that Politicized collective Identity is a major cause to

why people do not comply with rules during pandemics. This paper provided some insights and

situations that have led to such scenarios during pandemics. On the other hand, this paper stated

knowledge and trust as one of the reasons why some people will comply with rules. It explained

citizen’s perception and sources of information as one of the drivers that lead to willingness to

comply. Finally, this paper concluded that choosing to comply or not to comply is a

responsibility of an individual even though ones’ decision is powerful because it affects the

society either positively or negatively.

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References

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Asare, M. (2015). USING THE THEORY OF PLANNED BEHAVIOR TO DETERMINE.

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Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 17: 475–82.

Fischhoff, B (2013). The sciences of science communication. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci.

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Kristiansen IS, Halvorsen PA, Gyrd-Hansen D, 2007. Influenza pandemic: perception of risk and

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