Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic has seen one of the first large-scale uses of digital contact tracing to track a chain of infection and contain the spread of a virus. The new technology has posed challenges both for governments aiming at high and effective uptake and for citizens weighing its benefits (e.g., protecting others’ health) against the potential risks (e.g., loss of data privacy). Our cross-sectional survey with repeated measures across four samples in Germany (N = 4357) focused on psychological factors contributing to the public adoption of digital contact tracing. We found that public acceptance of privacy-encroaching measures (e.g., granting the government emergency access to people’s medical records or location tracking data) decreased over the course of the pandemic. Intentions to use contact tracing apps—hypothetical ones or the Corona-Warn-App launched in Germany in June 2020—were high. Users and non-users of the Corona-Warn-App differed in their assessment of its risks and benefits, in their knowledge of the underlying technology, and in their reasons to download or not to download the app. Trust in the app’s perceived security and belief in its effectiveness emerged as psychological factors playing a key role in its adoption. We incorporate our findings into a behavioral framework for digital contact tracing and provide policy recommendations.
Highlights
The COVID-19 pandemic has seen one of the first large-scale uses of digital contact tracing to track a chain of infection and contain the spread of a virus
Economic aid, and behavioral regulations have all been enlisted to curb the damage of the COVID-19 p andemic[1,2]
With the exception of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa in 2014–20166, the COVID-19 pandemic has seen the first large-scale use of digital contact tracing for epidemiological p urposes[7]
Summary
The COVID-19 pandemic has seen one of the first large-scale uses of digital contact tracing to track a chain of infection and contain the spread of a virus. Smartphone tracking apps use GPS, telecommunication, or Bluetooth data to create a list of contacts with whom a user may have been co-located[5]. This contact information is stored locally on the phone or on a centralized server. The Corona-Warn-App, launched in Germany in June 2020, is an open-source Bluetooth-based decentralized smartphone app (https://www.coronawarn.app/en) that aims to ease the burden of the pandemic on local public health authorities by complementing their offline contact tracing efforts. The epidemiological impact of digital contact tracing apps remains low[10] or uncertain ( the NHS app has been reported to have a positive impact;11): No country has been able to prevent more widespread outbreaks
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