Dataset Information

Public trust, policing, and the COVID-19 pandemic: Evidence from an electoral authoritarian regime.

ABSTRACT: We examine how trust shapes compliance with public health restrictions during the COVID- 19 pandemic in Uganda. We use an endorsement experiment embedded in a mobile phone survey to show that messages from government officials generate more support for public health restrictions than messages from religious authorities, traditional leaders, or international NGOs. We further show that compliance with these restrictions is strongly positively correlated with trust in government, but only weakly correlated with trust in local authorities or other citizens. We use measures of trust from both before and during the pandemic to rule out the possibility that trust is a function of the pandemic itself. The relationship between trust and compliance is especially strong for the Ministry of Health and-more surprisingly-the police. We conclude that trust is crucial for encouraging compliance but note that it may be difficult to sustain, particularly in settings where governments and police forces have reputations for repression.

SUBMITTER: Blair RA

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9122739 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Public trust, policing, and the COVID-19 pandemic: Evidence from an electoral authoritarian regime.

Blair Robert A RA Curtice Travis T Dow David D Grossman Guy G

Social science & medicine (1982) 20220521

We examine how trust shapes compliance with public health restrictions during the COVID- 19 pandemic in Uganda. We use an endorsement experiment embedded in a mobile phone survey to show that messages from government officials generate more support for public health restrictions than messages from religious authorities, traditional leaders, or international NGOs. We further show that compliance with these restrictions is strongly positively correlated with trust in government, but only weakly co ...[more]

PMID: 35623233

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Project description:ObjectiveTo assess whether knowledge of Tuskegee, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency's detainment of children, and satisfaction with the George Floyd death investigation were associated with trust in actors involved in the development and distribution of coronavirus vaccines.Data sources and study settingNational survey with a convenience sample of Black (n = 1019) and Hispanic (n = 994) adults between July 1 and 26, 2021.Study designObservational study using stratified adjusted logistic regression models to measure the association between ratings of the trustworthiness of actors involved in the development and distribution of coronavirus vaccines.Principal findingsAmong Black respondents, lower satisfaction with the George Floyd death investigation was associated with lower trustworthiness ratings of pharmaceutical companies (ME: -0.09; CI: -0.15, 0.02), the FDA (ME: -0.07; CI: -0.14, -0.00), the Trump Administration (ME: -0.09; CI: -0.16, -0.02), the Biden Administration (ME: -0.07, CI: -0.10, 0.04), and elected officials (ME: -0.10, CI: -0.18, -0.03). Among Hispanic respondents, lower satisfaction was associated with lower trustworthiness ratings of the Trump Administration (ME: -0.14, CI: -0.22, -0.06) and elected officials (ME: -0.11; CI: -0.19, -0.02). Greater knowledge of ICE's detainment of children and families among Hispanic respondents was associated with lower trustworthiness ratings of state elected officials (ME: -0.09, CI: -0.16, 0.01). Greater knowledge of the US Public Health Service Study of Syphilis in Tuskegee was associated with higher trustworthiness ratings of their usual source of care (ME: 0.09; CI: 0.28, 0.15) among Black respondents (ME: 0.09; CI: 0.01, 0.16).ConclusionsAmong Black respondents, lower satisfaction with the George Floyd death investigation was associated with lowered levels of trust in pharmaceutical companies, some government officials, and administrators; it was not associated with the erosion of trust in direct sources of health care delivery, information, or regulation. Among Hispanic respondents, greater knowledge of the ICE detainments was associated with lower trustworthiness ratings of elected state officials. Paradoxically, higher knowledge of the Study of Syphilis in Tuskegee was associated with higher trustworthiness ratings in usual sources of care.

Project description:ObjectivesThe emergence of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and subsequent pandemic has led to the most substantive large-scale, open, and public social discussion of epidemiology and science in recent history. In the United States (US), extensive debate has ensued as to the risk posed by the disease, whether the health system is prepared to manage a high volume of critical cases, whether any number of public health responses are necessary and appropriate, and the appropriate ways to prevent, manage, and treat the pandemic. I hypothesized that the interplay between scientists, policymakers, and the public in an open forum was associated with increased overall public trust in science and scientists, but that this was moderated by political orientation and/or religious commitment. In the context of a public health emergency, it is important to understand the degree to which science and scientists are trusted to produce information that can provide reassurance and also can explain the details of a highly complex event such as a viral pandemic while providing actionable recommendations.Study designThe study design was analytic cross-sectional.MethodsData were obtained on March 17-18, 2020, from a sample of 242 US-based Amazon Mechanical Turk users. Respondents completed a 49-question survey consisting of key sociodemographic variables, political affiliation, religious commitment, and two iterations of the Trust in Science and Scientist Inventory (one for March 2020, and one for December 2019 using retrospective recall). Changes in mean level of trust and interaction with political affiliation and/or religious commitment were assessed using mixed ANOVA via the general linear model.ResultsOn a scale from 1 (low trust) to 5 (high trust), the mean level of trust in science and scientists was static; 3.82 in December 2019 and 3.81 in March 2020. Conservative political orientation and high religious commitment were associated with significantly less overall trust in science; the interaction effect suggested that liberal trust in science decreased slightly from December 2019 to March 2020, whereas conservative trust increased slightly.ConclusionsCounter to my expectations, the overall level of trust in science remained static after the first several months of COVID-19 in the US, although there is some evidence that political orientation was associated with magnitude and directionality of change in trust. Continued examination of these trends is important for understanding public response to epidemiologic recommendations.

Dataset Information

Public trust, policing, and the COVID-19 pandemic: Evidence from an electoral authoritarian regime.

Publications

Public trust, policing, and the COVID-19 pandemic: Evidence from an electoral authoritarian regime.

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