 Interpersonal value regulates infection-risky social contact across 61 societiesHongyu Sun,
Giuliana Spadaro,
Sofia Pelica (),
Roza Kamiloğlu,
Loes Abrahams,
Josh Ackerman,
Derya Atamtürk Duyar,
Laith Al-Shawaf,
Alexandra Alvergne,
Benja Amponsah,
Njål Andersen,
Jan Antfolk,
Dery Duyar,
Songshi Bai,
Teresa Barbato,
Sergio Barbosa,
Pat Barclay,
D. Vaughn Becker,
Beatriz de Sou,
Paulo Sérgio Boggio,
Robert Böhm,
Watcharaporn Boonyasiri,
Andrea Camperio Ciani,
Ali Can,
Trevor Case,
Chan Aa,
Sebastian Luis,
Christian Elbæk,
Cora Chevallier,
Éloïse Côté,
Sam Dal Gg,
Florencio Delg,
Florencio Delgado Espinoza,
Daniel Fessler,
Izzet Duyar,
Christian Elbaek J,
Ana María Fernández,
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Daniel Ferreira L,
Pablo Flore-Kant Pp,
Natalia Frankow,
Ana Freitas,
Márta Fülöp,
Marce Gallucci Uu,
Zachary Garfield Vv,
Margar Garrido Ww (),
Macar González-Portilla Yy,
Dmitry Grigor Zz,
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Brah Hamdaou,
Sahar Nadeem,
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Lina Hansson,
Yoel Inbar,
Benjamin Hilbig Ii,
Ian Hohm,
Szilárd Holka,
Tingting Ji,
Yutaka Horita,
Hsin-Ping Hsu,
Šárka Kaňková,
Olivia James,
Tomasz Jarmakowski,
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Willia Jimén-Leal,
Shanmukh Kamble,
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Jinseok Kim,
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David Lewis,
Debra Lieberman,
Hongtao Liu,
Urszula Marcinkowska,
Claudio Lópe-Call Lll,
Ingunn Lund (),
Fiorella Macchiavello Bb,
Ol Marchenk,
Ursz Marcinkowska Pppp,
Gabriela Mariana Marcu,
Norbert Meskó,
Suyash Mishra,
Kalo Mitev,
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Fredy Monge Rodríg,
Leticia Morello,
Bruna Mota,
Damian Murray,
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Joshua Tybur,
Junhui Wu,
Su-Ling Yeh,
Eric Kenson,
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Victoria Wai,
Lan Yeung,
Janis Zickfeld J,
Joshua Tybur,
Megan Gunnar,
Tingting Ji,
Šárka Kaňková,
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Antonia Tsitseli and
Joseph Watts
Post-Print from HAL Abstract: Interpersonal contact is essential for cooperation and care, but it also provides a route for pathogen transmission between individuals. Hence, a key challenge for social organisms involves maintaining beneficial social contact while also limiting exposure to infection risks. Existing proposals suggest that this trade-off is guided by the interpersonal value of specific social targets. In addition, ecological and cultural factors, including historical pathogen prevalence, individualism-collectivism, tightness–looseness, and relational mobility, might also shape how people avoid pathogens. To test whether and how infection-risky social contact varies with individual-level interpersonal value and these societal-level factors, we collected data from 47,756 participants across 61 societies. Participants were randomly assigned to picture a social target - either a friend, acquaintance, stranger, or enemy. They then rated their comfort with infection-risky contact with that target (e.g., drinking from the same water bottle) and whether they would touch the target when greeting them. In all societies, participants were more comfortable with infection-risky contact and more likely to engage in physical contact during greetings with targets of higher interpersonal value. Such associations varied only modestly across societies. Notably, the associations between infection-risky contact and societal-level factors depended on target interpersonal value and were concentrated among high-value targets—contact was lower where historical pathogen prevalence and tightness were greater and higher where individualism and relational mobility were greater. These findings suggest that infection-risky contact is primarily guided by the value of social targets, with ecological and cultural factors playing a lesser role. Date: 2026-10-15 Published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2026, 123 (42), ⟨10.1073/pnas.26157391231of9⟩ Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05837577 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.26157391231of9 Access Statistics for this paper More papers in Post-Print from HAL |
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