Effects Of Social Distancing Research Articles

Favor-Asking as Used by Jordanian University Students: A Socio-Pragmatic Study

This paper contributes to the existing literature on an important aspect of politeness by investigating the linguistic performance of the speech act of favor-asking as used by Jordanian university students. Specifically, it aims to explore the effect of gender and social distance on favor-asking performance. Data were collected from 100 Jordanian university students (50 males and 50 females) studying at two Jordanian universities: Jordan University of Science & Technology and Yarmouk University. The data were analyzed based on the speech act theory, using the content analysis model (i.e., the Cross-Cultural Speech Act Realization Project (CCSARP) proposed by Blum-Kulka et al. (1989). Results demonstrated that the core strategy used in favor-asking among the students is significantly affected by gender and social distance. Conventionally indirect strategies (CISs) were found to be the most used category among all strategies; however, the female participants tended to use them much more often than the male participants. Keywords: Favour-asking, Applied linguistics, Sociolinguistics, Pragmatics, Jordanian society.

Vulnerability and resilience among women migrant street vendors during the COVID-19 pandemic

PurposeWomen migrant street vendors are considered a vulnerable group in societies, thereby being hard hit during a crisis. This research aims to examine effects of COVID-19 social distancing on their businesses, consumption, health and general lives; solutions and mitigation strategies that they adopted in response to these adverse effects; and their recovery of socioeconomic lives after social distancing.Design/methodology/approachThe data were collected from the women migrant street vendors in urban Vietnam. Descriptive statistics, probit model and ordered probit model were used for empirical analysis.FindingsWomen migrant street vendors faced immense challenges during social distancing. They also lacked solutions to sustain their businesses and were forced to resort to various mitigation strategies. Their socioeconomic lives were also slow to recover after social distancing. In addition, those experiencing greater business loss faced more adverse effects during social distancing and have more difficulties in the recovery of socioeconomic lives after social distancing.Practical implicationsThis research highlights the importance of redesigning social policies to support women migrant street vendors during crises. It also emphasizes the need to formalize and legalize their activities to foster sustainable and inclusive development in the long term.Originality/valueTo the best of the authors’ knowledge, this research is among the first attempts to explore the effects of COVID-19 social distancing on the women migrant street vendors and to examine how they respond to these adverse effects.

The Joint Effect of Social Comparison and Social Distance on Evaluation of Intertemporal Choice Outcomes in Event-related Potential Studies.

Intertemporal choice plays a crucial role in our daily lives, influencing decisions related to education, health, consumption, and investment. This research proposes an innovative experimental protocol that examines how social comparison and social distance jointly affect the neural processes involved in outcome assessment for intertemporal choices. The study is based on the theoretical framework of cognitive resource competition. This protocol enables researchers to dynamically establish an indifference point for each participant, effectively eliminating the influence of any biased indifference points on the assessment of intertemporal choices. Consequently, the study solely measures the combined impact of social comparison and social distance on how participants evaluate intertemporal choice outcomes. The findings reveal that individuals are more inclined to opt for immediate outcomes under negative unfair conditions. Moreover, compared to the fair and positive unfair conditions, people tend to undervalue delayed outcomes in the negative unfair condition. The strength of this approach lies in its dynamic indifference point setting, making it an effective method to investigate the influence of various external factors (such as social status and power level) on intertemporal decision-making. While the protocol is designed to measure electrophysiological events like event-related potentials, it can also be tailored for use with fMRI.

Mental health effects of social distancing in Switzerland

This analysis examines the effect of COVID-19 on public mental health in Switzerland. Following an event-study framework, we compare helpline call volume and duration before and after the outbreak of the first and second wave. The use of administrative phone-level data allows us to i) decompose the total effects into an intensive and extensive margin and ii) calculate a measure of unmet need. For the first wave, our results show that callers with a history of helpline contacts increase calls substantially. We also identify capacity constraints leading to unmet need for psychological counseling. Finally, we find no effects in the second wave, which might be explained by a number of factors including the absence of a lockdown and less restrictive social distancing measures.

Improved social force model considering the influence of COVID-19 pandemic: Pedestrian evacuation under regulation

Collective behavior has been frequently studied in previous works. However, during pandemics, the method in which system dynamics control the collective behavior of pedestrians has rarely been studied. To further understand this issue, an improved social force model is proposed in this paper to explore the potential constraints caused by pandemics during pedestrian evacuations. During COVID-19, Regulatory authorities usually require pedestrians to keep a certain social distance from each other to avoid virus infection. Our model can characterize the feature that pedestrians are sensitive to surrounding pedestrians within this prescriptive social distance. Based on the simulated results in an ordinary room, the effects of prescriptive social distance, behavioral response times and other potential factors on evacuation efficiency are compared to reflect the changes caused by COVID-19. The main findings are as follows. (1) Trying to maintain a social distance of 1.5 m will not delay evacuations but instead promote overall process of evacuations. Under the appropriate desired speed, a win‒win situation between epidemic safety and evacuation efficiency can be achieved. (2) The increase in prescriptive social distance under a high desired speed will slightly promote evacuations. When the desired speed is too low, however, it may substantially reduce evacuation efficiency. (3) The response time reflects the epidemic sensitivity of pedestrians. For pedestrians in congestion, a high response time value indicates a longer social distance adjustment, which will have a certain inhibitory effect on evacuation efficiency. (4) The presence of epidemic-sensitive pedestrians can effectively inhibit the “faster-is-slower effect”. This work will help managers formulate relevant evacuation plans by taking advantage of the balance between personal purpose of fast evacuation and the public regulations, thereby inhibiting the spread of COVID-19 without lowing evacuation efficiency.

A Survey of Behaviors, Beliefs, and Perceptions of COVID-19 in Rural Appalachian Ohio

Background: Preventing the spread of COVID-19 comes with many challenges. Considering the sociobehavioral effects of social distancing in rural communities specifically is incredibly important. No previous studies have been published about adherence to COVID-19 preventative measures and viewpoints on vaccination/other prevention measures in the rural Appalachian region of Ohio specifically. This present study will describe the results of a survey regarding perceptions of COVID-19 in rural communities.Methods: A 20-question cross-sectional survey was administered over a 6-week period from February to April 2021. Survey distribution was completed via flyers with QR codes hung at 4 medical offices in Columbiana and Tuscarawas counties. The survey was adapted from the standardized FluTEST survey. Descriptive statistics and bivariate analyses were used for comparison.Results: We had 23 respondents after removing incomplete/nonconsenting responses. Our data showed that contracting COVID-19 was associated with vaccine distrust. Females and those with health risk factors were found to be more cautious when compared to males and those without risk factors, respectively. Respondents under age 65 years were more likely to trust government health agencies. Those with emotional distress were more likely to take precautions in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic.Conclusion: To prevent widening health inequalities in the particularly vulnerable population of Appalachia, further study with larger sample size should be conducted. This information can be used by health care providers to tailor patient education regarding COVID-19 vaccine administration, treatment, and prevention measures.

Young people’s mental and social distress in times of international crisis: evidence from helpline calls, 2019–2022

We document mental and social distress of children, adolescents and adults, using data on 3 million calls to German helplines between January 2019 and May 2022. High-frequency data from crisis helpline logs offer rich information on the evolution of “revealed distress” among the most vulnerable, unaffected by researchers’ study design and framing. Distress of adults, measured by the volume of calls, rose significantly after both the outbreak of the pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. In contrast, the overall revealed distress of children and adolescents did not increase during those crises. The nature of young people’s concerns, however, changed more strongly than for adults after the COVID-19 outbreak. Consistent with the effects of social distancing, call topics of young people shifted from problems with school and peers to problems with family and mental health. We find the share of severe mental health problems among young people to have increased with a delay, in the second and third year of the pandemic.

Direct indicators of social distancing effectiveness in COVID-19 outbreak stages: a correlational analysis of case contacts and population mobility in Korea.

The effectiveness of social distancing during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has been evaluated using the magnitude of changes in population mobility. This study aimed to investigate a direct indicator-namely, the number of close contacts per patient with confirmed COVID-19. From week 7, 2020 to week 43, 2021, population movement changes were calculated from the data of two Korean telecommunication companies and Google in accordance with social distancing stringency levels. Data on confirmed cases and their close contacts among residents of Gyeonggi Province, Korea were combined at each stage. Pearson correlation analysis was conducted to compare the movement data with the change in the number of contacts for each confirmed case calculated by stratification according to age group. The reference value of the population movement data was set using the value before mid-February 2020, considering each data's characteristics. In the age group of 18 or younger, the number of close contacts per confirmed case decreased or increased when the stringency level was strengthened or relaxed, respectively. In adults, the correlation was relatively low, with no correlation between the change in the number of close contacts per confirmed case and the change in population movement after the commencement of vaccination for adults. The effectiveness of governmental social distancing policies against COVID-19 can be evaluated using the number of close contacts per confirmed case as a direct indicator, especially for each age group. Such an analysis can facilitate policy changes for specific groups.

Numerical simulation of Covid-19 model with integer and non-integer order: The effect of environment and social distancing

We consider an epidemiological model that takes into account pathogens in the environment and social distancing. Such model with six classes has been updated with fractional differential operators and piecewise differential operators. Equilibrium points and reproductive number for the model have been obtained using next generation approach. Necessary optimality conditions for the model modified by addition of some control variables have been presented. For the numerical solution of the model, a numerical method based on Newton polynomial has been considered. The graphical representations for the model with fractional and piecewise derivatives have been presented to better understand the dynamic of model incorporating environment and social distancing.

The impacts of COVID-19 and social distancing on transport mode usage and travel satisfaction: Evidence from a transit-oriented city

This paper examines the impact of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) on travel behaviour and satisfaction in Hong Kong, a transit-oriented city. We analysed data from an online questionnaire survey (N = 1,119) to examine the factors that affect mode usage behaviour and travel satisfaction and considered several pandemic-related variables, including the perceived effectiveness of social distancing policies, the frequency of online activities and the perceived usefulness of technology. The results of our structural equation models revealed that (1) the modal shift from public transport to personalised transport was minimal in our case study, (2) an efficient public transport system improved passengers’ travel satisfaction, with reduced crowdedness enhancing this effect, and (3) the perceived effectiveness of social distancing influenced travel satisfaction and mode usage frequency but not the decision to shift to virtual ways of conducting activities. Our findings provide insight into the importance of a resilient transit system to maintain the population’s confidence in public transport and ensure travel satisfaction during the pandemic.

Effects of social comparison direction, comparison distance, and message framing on health behavioral intention in online support groups

This study advances prior research on social comparison by testing the effects of social comparison direction, comparison distance, as well as message framing on perceived similarity, self-esteem, and health behavioral intention in the context of an online support group (OSG) for diet and weight loss. A 2 (comparison direction: up vs. down) by 2 (comparison distance: high vs. low) by 2 (framing: gain vs. loss) factorial experiment involving 275 adult participants was conducted online in the United States. Findings showed that participants perceived themselves to be more similar to the comparison target who was doing better than themselves than the target who was doing worse. The difference of perceived similarity between comparison directions was greater when comparison distance was low than high. However, upward comparison decreased self-esteem whereas downward comparison enhanced self-esteem. Perceived similarity and self-esteem both contributed to health efficacy, which led to health behavioral intention. Message framing did not show a significant impact on perceived similarity or self-esteem. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Algorithms for the Generation of an Electronic Customized Answer Booklet for Universities

Academic institutions in Uganda are accustomed to using pen-on-paper exams where students are given an answer booklet at the time of the exam. Universities frequently use customized answer booklets which help to lower the prevalence of exam fraud among students. Universities continue to encounter the challenge of examining summative questions like essays after the migration to electronic examinations brought about by the Covid-19 social distancing effects due to the lack of a customized electronic answer booklet. The primary goal of this research was to design algorithms for a customized electronic answer booklet. These algorithms went through six stages, starting with analyzing the problem and ending with developing the algorithms. The design, analysis, and coding of four algorithms i.e. cover page, single empty page, adding a page, and watermark addition algorithms was completed. The designed electronic personalized answer booklet is dynamic in nature and supports page addition, text crossing out or rubbing, and navigating through the electronic question paper. Any academic institution may utilize this electronic answer book.

Associations of social interactions during the COVID-19 pandemic with cognitive function among the South Korean older adults

BackgroundWe aimed to demonstrate the associations between social interactions within social distancing norms during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and cognitive function among South Korean older adults.MethodsData from the 2017 and 2020 Survey of Living Conditions and Welfare Needs of Korean Older Persons were used. There were 18,813 participants (7,539 males; 11,274 females). T-test and multiple logistic regression analyses verified whether the mean difference in older adults’ cognitive function before and during the COVID-19 pandemic was statistically significant. We also examined the associations between social interactions and cognitive function. The key results were presented as odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CI).ResultsAll participants were more likely to experience cognitive impairment during the COVID-19 pandemic than before (males: OR 1.56, 95% CI 1.3–1.78; females: OR 1.26, 95% CI: 1.14–1.40). Cognitive impairment increased linearly with the decreased frequency of face-to-face contact with non-cohabiting children. Possible cognitive impairment was greater for females who had not visited senior welfare centers for the past year (OR 1.43, 95% CI 1.21–1.69).ConclusionKorean older adults’ cognitive function declined during the COVID-19 pandemic and was associated with reduced social interactions because of social distancing measures. Alternative interventions should be promoted for safely restoring social networks, considering the adverse effects of long-term social distancing on older adults’ mental health and cognitive function.

Monkeypox outbreak: Psychological distance, risk perception, and support for risk mitigation.

Building on construal level theory, results from a survey based on a nationally representative sample of U.S. adults (N = 1000) indicate an indirect effect of social distance and temporal distance perception on emotional response, policy support, and vaccination intention through risk perception. This study also reveals that social dominance orientation contributes to perceived psychological distance of the monkeypox outbreak. These results suggest that communication about a public health crisis such as monkeypox needs to emphasize its broader community impact, rather than focusing on the primary population affected.

Comfort Foods and Community Connectedness: Investigating Diet Change during COVID-19 Using YouTube Videos on Twitter

Unprecedented lockdowns at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic have drastically changed the routines of millions of people, potentially impacting important health-related behaviors. In this study, we use YouTube videos embedded in tweets about diet, exercise and fitness posted before and during COVID-19 to investigate the influence of the pandemic lockdowns on diet and nutrition. In particular, we examine the nutritional profile of the foods mentioned in the transcript, description and title of each video in terms of six macronutrients (protein, energy, fat, sodium, sugar, and saturated fat). These macronutrient values were further linked to demographics to assess if there are specific effects on those potentially having insufficient access to healthy sources of food. Interrupted time series analysis revealed a considerable shift in the aggregated macronutrient scores before and during COVID-19. In particular, whereas areas with lower incomes showed decrease in energy, fat, and saturated fat, those with higher percentage of African Americans showed an elevation in sodium. Word2Vec word similarities and odds ratio analysis suggested a shift from popular diets and lifestyle bloggers before the lockdowns to the interest in a variety of healthy foods, communal sharing of quick and easy recipes, as well as a new emphasis on comfort foods. To the best of our knowledge, this work is novel in terms of linking attention signals in tweets, content of videos, their nutrients profile, and aggregate demographics of the users. The insights made possible by this combination of resources are important for monitoring the secondary health effects of social distancing, and informing social programs designed to alleviate these effects.

Fear of Travelling after Covid-19, the Moderation Effect of Social Distancing

COVID-19 has caused unparalleled public dread, which will most certainly impede tourist business recovery once the epidemic is gone. This research investigates the causes of the general public's epidemic travel anxiety, as well as how individuals impose self-protection, coping, and resilience with travel. The study blends theories such as protection motive theory, coping theory, and resilience theory to achieve the research goal. The primary data came from an online poll of 322 Southeast Asian travelers. According to the findings, the magnitude and vulnerability of the danger might induce "travel dread," which leads to protection motivation and precautionary travel behaviors during the pandemic. The findings also demonstrate that social distancing has memory consequences. In other words, individuals who willingly engaged in social separation during the pandemic are more likely to continue doing so in the post-COVID period since their long-term behavior has been influenced.
 

Household food insecurity during the COVID-19 pandemic is associated with anxiety and depression among US- and foreign-born adults: Findings from a nationwide survey

The COVID-19 pandemic led to significant disruptions to household food security with as many as 10.5 % of US households experiencing food insecurity during 2020. Food insecurity is associated with psychological distress including depression and anxiety. However, to the best of our knowledge, no study has analyzed the association between COVID-19 food insecurity and poor mental health outcomes by place of birth. The Understanding the Impact of the Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) and Social Distancing on Physical and Psychosocial (Mental) Health and Chronic Diseases national survey assessed the physical and psychosocial effects of social and physical distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic among a diverse population of US- and foreign-born adults. Multivariable logistic regression was used to assess the relationship between place of birth and food security status and anxiety (N = 4817) and depression (N = 4848) among US- and foreign-born individuals. Stratified models subsequently analyzed the associations between food security and poor mental health among US- and foreign-born populations separately. Model controls included sociodemographic and socioeconomic factors. Low and very low household food security were associated with greater odds of both anxiety (low: odds ratio (OR) [95 % confidence interval (CI)] = 2.07 [1.42–3.03]; very low: OR [95 % CI] = 3.35 [2.15–5.21]) and depression (low: OR [95 % CI] = 1.92 [1.33–2.78]; very low: OR [95 % CI] = 2.36 [1.52–3.65]). However, this relationship was attenuated among foreign-born individuals compared to US-born individuals in the stratified models. All models found a dose-response relationship between increasing levels of food insecurity and anxiety and depressive symptoms. Further research is needed to explore the factors that attenuated the relationship between food insecurity and poor mental health among foreign-born individuals.

How social interaction shapes habitual and occasional low-carbon consumption behaviors: Evidence from ten cities in China

Low-carbon consumption behaviors (LCBs) are pivotal for alleviating climate change caused by human activities. Most current studies rarely distinguish between different types of LCBs, and fail to capture the multifaceted effects of social interaction and its situational boundaries on individual behavior. To address this drawback, this study divides LCBs into habitual low-carbon consumption behavior (HLCB) and occasional low-carbon consumption behavior (OLCB), and detects the effects of social interaction, attitudinal uncertainty, and knowledge distance on both behavior categories using data from 2139 residents of ten cities in China. The instrumental variable method, gender-based test, and data from the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) 2020 are used to check the robustness of the results. Although the findings indicate a positive linear relationship between social interaction and HLCB, they also indicate an inverted U-shaped association between social interaction and OLCB. Attitudinal uncertainty not only positively moderates the association between social interaction and HLCB but also reinforces the inverted U-shaped association between social interaction and OLCB. Furthermore, knowledge distance steepens the association between social interaction and OLCB, while no moderating effect is found between social interaction and HLCB. This study addresses an understudied component of the multifaceted effects of social interaction and sheds light on targeted policy schemes for different types of LCBs.

The influence of digital competence of academicians on students’ engagement at university level: moderating effect of the pandemic outbreak

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to investigate how the digital competence of academicians influences students’ engagement in learning activities in the face of the pandemic outbreak. In addition to this, the paper investigates how digital competence influences each dimension of student engagement (cognitive, affective and behavioural).Design/methodology/approachA cross-sectional, quantitative and explanatory research design was used to conduct the study. Data were gathered with an adopted questionnaire administered to a randomly selected sample of 500 university faculty members who were not digitally literate prior to the outbreak of the pandemic. Apart from the goodness of data tests, inferential statistics were applied to test hypotheses.FindingsResults indicate a significant influence of teachers’ digital competence on student engagement and the pandemic outbreak positively moderates the relationship. Digital competence equally influences all three dimensions of student engagement.Practical implicationsThe outbreak of COVID-19 made the adoption of digital life more compulsive and the nations with already available digital infrastructure and digital competence effectively minimized the adverse effect of social distancing as a result of the pandemic outbreak. Findings emphasize practitioners to focus on the digital capacity building of academicians and the provision of digital infrastructure to facilitate student engagement.Social implicationsSociety is transforming into a hi-tech lifestyle and technological advancement is penetrating almost every sphere of life at an unprecedented pace. From the digitalization of day-to-day affairs to e-governance, the adoption of technology is becoming a new normal. The outbreak of the pandemic overtook academic institutions equally. So, the social distancing compelled academicians and other stakeholders of universities to switchover from in-campus classes to online classes. The findings enrich the existing body of literature by explaining how digital competence has a determining role in ensuring student engagement amid the COVID-19 outbreak.Originality/valueThis research is a seminal work, as it tests the influence of digital competence on student engagement with the moderating role of the pandemic outbreak. To the best of the author’s knowledge, existing literature does not present this kind of research.

The impact of social distancing on tourists’ preferences for anthropomorphism

Social distancing is an effective way to reduce infection risk during pandemics, such as COVID-19. It is important for the tourism industry to understand the effect of social distancing on tourist behavior to better adapt to this emerging environment. This study investigates the role of social distancing in tourists’ preferences for anthropomorphism. Based on three experimental studies, this study found that tourists tend to prefer anthropomorphism more under conditions of social distancing (vs. nonsocial distancing). This effect was induced by the higher perceived warmth of anthropomorphism when one had to practice social distancing. Such effects are only significant among tourists with higher levels of interdependent self-construal. This study makes significant theoretical contributions and provides important practical implications for tourism marketing and service design during pandemic and epidemic crises.