Analyzing Risk Communication and Behavioral Change During the COVID-19 Pandemic

In partnership with the Department of State’s Diplomacy Lab, the SIPA Capstone team sought to understand public health messaging across the globe during the first wave of the pandemic. The Capstone team identified what messages cut through the noise, who were the key players involved and how sociocultural factors may have affected the effectiveness of the messages communicated. The targeted countries in their analysis included Nepal, Vietnam, Taiwan, South Korea, Italy, France and Uruguay. 

The team found that Taiwan, Vietnam and Uruguay benefited from lessons learned during recent epidemics; particularly, in Taiwan, a trauma of the 2003 SARS outbreak and a decades-long exclusion from the WHO helped it create a strong, self-reliant health system which was instrumental in the country’s pandemic response. Italy and France, which have strong data privacy laws, were less effective in using digital tools to control the spread of the virus compared to South Korea, Vietnam and Taiwan. Social norms played a role too; in Nepal and Vietnam the habit of mask-wearing in urban areas was common long before this pandemic due to pollution; in South Korea, Confucian communitarianism and Foucauldian disciplinary techniques helped create “ideal” citizens who adhered to health protocols; and in Vietnam the government’s call for national unity against “foreign invaders” contributed to enforcing a strong observance of the measures. 

Note: The findings do not represent the  views or policies of the Department of State or the U.S. government.