RAPID: Evaluating Ebola Message Effects over Time: Risk Perceptions, Trust in and Attributions of Responsibility to Institutions, Personal Behavior and Policy Support

RAPID：评估埃博拉信息随时间的影响：风险认知、对机构的信任和责任归属、个人行为和政策支持

• 批准号: 1505353
• 负责人: Branden Johnson
• 金额: $ 13.48万
• 依托单位: Decision Science Research Institute
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2014
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2014-11-15 至 2015-10-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1505353&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: RAPID; Evaluating; Ebola; Message; Effects

While Ebola threatens a major catastrophe in West Africa, its public health impacts in the U.S. are likely to be minor, shaped more by fear than transmission of the virus. The effect, however, on Americans' trust in public health authorities, and thus the impacts on future epidemics, among other impacts, may be much larger. Research to track changes in public views on Ebola risk and management performance, especially their impacts on trust and attribution of responsibility to varied institutions (e.g., Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Department of Health and Human Services, Obama administration, Congress, hospitals), and individual medical professionals and travelers from West Africa, is vital to help foretell public responses to future epidemic threats. Given the diverse and conflicting messages about Ebola risks and institutional performance now present, we also must understand how such messages affect public interpretations of Ebola risk and institutional performance. Results can help improve public health management and communication, plus help integrate theory on risk perception, trust in institutions, attribution of responsibility to institutions, and risk communication.This study involves five surveys over 6 months with the same randomly sampled set of people from a diverse national online panel, exploiting the strength of a longitudinal survey experiment to assess causes of change over time. The experimental part of the study tests effects of alternative messages over this extended period, tracking their interactions with interpretive screens provided by trust and attributions of responsibility. Two messages concern the 21-day quarantine based on WHO recommendations: one message that repeats the authorities' reassurance that this quarantine is long enough that the affected person will not become symptomatic after release, and one that warns (based on expert analyses) of small but non-zero risks that symptoms will appear beyond this period. Besides testing the effect of the latter message on judged risk, trust, and support for the 21-day quarantine limit, the study also tests the inoculation strategy of stimulating counter-arguments to reduce panic effects of later counter-attacks on the quarantine period. A third message, also an inoculation message, stressrd capabilities of the public health system despite inevitable mistakes, to see how this affects trust and responsibility-attribution ratings. In pre-event conditions this kind of inoculation seems to reduce public over-reaction to scary [terrorism] events, but in the midst of ongoing management of Ebola may be counter-productive. The final message will review arguments on specific policies (e.g., how to keep people from Ebola-afflicted West African nations out of the U.S., or from spreading disease while here). Varied belief, attitude and behavioral intention measures tracks effects of these manipulations, and tests potential moderators (e.g., worldview, affect, political ideology and partisanship). Finally, the research includes the first probe of how perceived relations among institutions affect trust and attributions (e.g., belief that CDC was free to act against Ebola without constraints from other institutions may increase its judged responsibility for subsequent failures of performance).

虽然埃博拉病毒可能在西非造成一场重大灾难，但它对美国的公共卫生影响可能很小，更多的是出于恐惧而不是病毒的传播。然而，这对美国人对公共卫生当局的信任的影响，以及对未来流行病等的影响可能要大得多。研究跟踪公众对埃博拉风险和管理绩效的看法变化，特别是它们对不同机构（例如疾病控制和预防中心、卫生与公共服务部、奥巴马政府、国会、医院）的信任和责任归属的影响以及来自西非的个别医疗专业人员和旅行者，对于帮助预测公众对未来流行病威胁的反应至关重要。鉴于目前存在关于埃博拉风险和机构绩效的多样化且相互矛盾的信息，我们还必须了解这些信息如何影响公众对埃博拉风险和机构绩效的解释。结果可以帮助改善公共卫生管理和沟通，并有助于整合有关风险认知、对机构的信任、机构责任归属和风险沟通的理论。这项研究涉及 6 个月内的五项调查，对象是来自同一组随机抽样的同一组人。不同的国家在线小组，利用纵向调查实验的力量来评估随时间变化的原因。该研究的实验部分测试了替代信息在这段时间内的影响，跟踪它们与信任和责任归属提供的解释屏幕的交互。根据世卫组织的建议，有两条信息涉及 21 天隔离：一条信息重申了当局的保证，即隔离时间足够长，以便受影响的人在释放后不会出现症状；另一条信息警告（根据专家分析）但在此期间之后症状出现的风险非零。除了测试后一条信息对判断风险、信任和对 21 天隔离限制的支持的影响外，该研究还测试了激发反论据的预防策略，以减少隔离期后期反击的恐慌影响。第三条信息，也是一条预防信息，强调公共卫生系统的能力，尽管不可避免地会出现错误，看看这如何影响信任和责任归因评级。在事件发生前的情况下，这种疫苗接种似乎可以减少公众对可怕的[恐怖主义]事件的过度反应，但在埃博拉病毒的持续管理过程中可能会适得其反。最后的信息将回顾有关具体政策的论点（例如，如何防止受埃博拉病毒影响的西非国家的人们离开美国，或防止在美国传播疾病）。各种信念、态度和行为意图测量追踪这些操纵的影响，并测试潜在的调节因素（例如世界观、情感、政治意识形态和党派之争）。最后，该研究首次探讨了机构之间的感知关系如何影响信任和归因（例如，相信疾病预防控制中心可以自由地针对埃博拉采取行动而不受其他机构的限制，这可能会增加其对后续绩效失败的判断责任）。