Voluntary adoption of social welfare-enhancing behavior: Mask-wearing in Spain during the COVID-19 outbreak.

ABSTRACT: With the spread of COVID-19, more countries now recommend their citizens to wear facemasks in public. The uptake of facemasks, however, remains far from universal in countries where this practice lacks cultural roots. In this paper, we aim to identify the barriers to mask-wearing in Spain, a country with no mask-wearing culture. We conduct one of the first nationally representative surveys (n = 4,000) about this unprecedented public health emergency and identify the profile of citizens who are more resistant to face-masking: young, educated, unconcerned with being infected, and with an introverted personality. Our results further indicate a positive correlation between a social norm of mask-wearing and mask uptake and demonstrate that uptake of facemasks is especially high among the elderl

SUBMITTER: Barcelo J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7707551 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature