Using Insights from Behavioral Economics to Mitigate the Spread of COVID-19
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PRACTICAL APPLICATION
Using Insights from Behavioral Economics to Mitigate the Spread of COVID‑19 Moslem Soofi1 · Farid Najafi2 · Behzad Karami‑Matin2
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
Abstract The outbreak of 2019 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has become a public health emergency of international concern. The number of COVID-infected individuals and related deaths continues to rise rapidly. Encouraging people to adopt and sustain preventive behaviors is a central focus of public health policies that seek to mitigate the spread of COVID-19. Public health policy needs improved methods to encourage people to adhere to COVID-19-preventive behaviors. In this paper, we introduce a number of insights from behavioral economics that help explain why people may behave irrationally during the COVID-19 pandemic. In particular, present bias, status quo bias, framing effect, optimism bias, affect heuristic, and herding behavior are discussed. We hope this paper will shed light on how insights from behavioral economics can enrich public health policies and interventions in the fight against COVID-19. Key Points for Decision Makers Behavioral economics acknowledges that people are not the rational decision makers assumed in the standard economic theory of decision making. Finite rationality and willpower lead people to apply the rules of thumb or heuristics to make their COVID19-related decisions rather than conducting cost-benefit analyses. Therefore, they may be biased in their COVID19-related decisions. Behavioral economics can help policy makers identify individuals’ decision biases and use them as starting points for designing COVID-19-preventive interventions. Behavioral economics interventions can help people behave rationally and make better COVID-19-related decisions.
* Behzad Karami‑Matin [email protected] 1
Social Development and Health Promotion Research Center, Health Institute, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran
Research Center for Environmental Determinants of Health, Health Institute, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran
2
1 Introduction The outbreak of 2019 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has become a public health emergency of international concern [1]. The number of COVID-infected individuals and related deaths continues to rise rapidly. COVID-19 is a serious threat to global health and the world economy and has caused widespread concern around the world. In the absence of approved treatments for and vaccines against COVID-19, preventive strategies and hygiene behaviors such as social distancing and stay-at-home policies, avoiding touching the face, and repeated hand washing are effective options in the fight against COVID-19 [2, 3]. During this pandemic, encouraging people to adopt and sustain preventive behaviors is a central focus of public health policies that seek to mitigate the spread of COVID-19. Behavioral economics has recently received a great deal of attention in public policy making [4]. This field of economics uses insights from t
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