 Social distancing in networks: A web-based interactive experimentEdoardo Gallo, Darija Barak and Alastair Langtry Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), 2023, vol. 107, issue C Abstract: The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic led to an unprecedented rise in the use of social distancing as a means to curb the spread of infection. We examine the effectiveness of fines and informational messages (nudges) in promoting social distancing in a framed web-based interactive experiment conducted during the first wave of the pandemic on a near-representative sample of the US population. Fines promote distancing, while nudges have a smaller and less robust impact. Individuals do more social distancing when they are aware they are a superspreader. Using an instrumental variable approach, we show suggestive evidence that progressives are more likely to practice distancing, and they are somewhat more responsive to fines. Keywords: Social distancing; Online experiment; Nudge; Superspreader; Political ideology (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:soceco:v:107:y:2023:i:c:s2214804323001167 DOI: 10.1016/j.socec.2023.102090 Access Statistics for this article Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics) is currently edited by Pablo Brañas Garza More articles in Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics) from Elsevier |
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