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Polarization and public health: partisan differences in social distancing during the Coronavirus pandemic

We study partisan differences in Americans' response to the Covid-19 pandemic. Political leaders and media outlets on the right and left have sent divergent messages about the severity of the crisis, which could impact the extent to which Republicans and Democrats engage in social distancing and other efforts to reduce disease transmission. We develop a simple model of a pandemic response with heterogeneous agents that clarifies the causes and consequences of heterogeneous responses. We use location data from a large sample of smartphones to show that areas with more Republicans engage in less social distancing, controlling for other factors including state policies, population density, and local COVID cases and deaths. We then present new survey evidence of significant gaps between Republicans and Democrats in beliefs about personal risk and the future path of the pandemic.

Lead investigator:

Hunt Allcott

Affiliation:

New York University

Primary topic:

Attitudes, media & governance

Region of data collection:

North America

Country of data collection

USA

Status of data collection

Complete

Type of data being collected:

From private company

Unit of real-time data collection

Country/Municipality

Start date

1/2020

End date

4/2020

Frequency

Weekly

Read the results from this research