Behavioral economics of the Covid-19 pandemic

  1. David Jimenez-Gomez 1
  2. José María Abellán Perpiñán 2
  1. 1 University of Alicante (España)
  2. 2 University of Murcia (España)
Revista:
Ekonomiaz: Revista vasca de economía

ISSN: 0213-3865

Año de publicación: 2021

Título del ejemplar: Covid-19. Efectos socioeconómicos de Ia crisis sanitaria y medidas de recuperación

Número: 100

Páginas: 26-41

Tipo: Artículo

Otras publicaciones en: Ekonomiaz: Revista vasca de economía

Resumen

We study the Covid-19 pandemic from the point of view of behavioral economics, which combines economics and psychology. We analyze the biases (for example, optimism bias) that may have had a greater impact on decision-making regarding the pandemic, as well as potential public health policies from a behavioral economics perspective. We contrast the use of «nudges» (non-coercive measures that do not use economic incentives) with legislative measures, and we advocate for a comprehensive approach that jointly uses the best interventions available, to generate healthy habits (that reduce the transmission of the virus). Finally, we apply this approach to the promotion of vaccination.

Referencias bibliográficas

  • Abellán Perpiñán, J.M.; Jimenez-Gomez, D. (2020): Behavioral Economics to Improve Lifestyle Choices and to Reduce Risk Factors (Economía del comportamiento para mejorar estilos de vida y reducir factores de riesgo), Gaceta Sanitaria, 34, 197– 199.
  • Abellán Perpiñán, J.M.; Jimenez-Gomez, D.; del Llano Señaris, J.E. (2020): La gestión de la pandemia de SARS-CoV-2 según la economía del comportamiento, in Blog Economía y Salud (AES), Barcelona, pp.89-94.
  • Abellán-Perpiñán, J.M.; Jimenez-Gomez, D.; Marín-López, B. (2021): Behavioral Economics in the Epidemiology of the Covid-19 Pandemic: Theory and Simulations.
  • Akerlof, G.A.; Kranton, R.E. (2000): Economics and Identity, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 115, 715-753.
  • Akerlof, G.A.; Kranton, R.E. (2005): Identity and the Economics of Organizations, The Journal of Economic Perspectives, 19, 9-32.
  • Akerlof, G.A.; Kranton, R.E. (2010): Identity Economics: How Our Identities Shape Our Work, Wages, and Well-Being, Princeton University Press.
  • Altman, D.G.; Bland, J.M. (1995): Statistics notes: Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, Bmj, 311, 485.
  • Anderson, R.M.; Heesterbeek, H.; Klinkenberg, D.; Hollingsworth, T.D. (2020): How will country-based mitigation measures influence the course of the COVID-19 epidemic?, The lancet, 395, 931-934.
  • Atkeson, A. (2020): What Will Be the Economic Impact of COVID-19 in the US? Rough Estimates of Disease Scenarios, NBER Working Paper Series, p. 25.
  • Baillon, A.; Schlesinger, H.; Van de Kuilen, G. (2018): Measuring higher order ambiguity preferences, Experimental Economics, 21, 233- 256.
  • Baron, J.; Ritov, I. (2004): Omission bias, indi- vidual differences, and normality, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 94, 74-85.
  • Benabou, R.; Tirole, J. (2006): Incentives and prosocial behavior, American Economic Review, 96, 1652-1678.
  • Bish, A.; Yardley, L.; Nicoll, A.; Michie, S. (2011): Factors associated with uptake of vaccination against pandemic influenza: a systematic review, Vaccine, 29, 6472- 6484.
  • Bodas, M.; Peleg, K. (2020): Self-isolation compliance in the COVID-19 era influenced by compensation: Findings from a recent survey in Israel: public attitudes toward the COVID-19 outbreak and self-isolation: a cross sectional study of the adult population of Israel, Health Affairs, 39, 936-941.
  • Bond, R.M.; Fariss, C.J.; Jones, J.J.; Kramer, A.D.I.; Marlow, c.; settle, j.e.; fowler, j.h. (2012): A 61-million-person experiment in social influence and political mobilization, Nature, 489, 295-298.
  • Britton, T.; Ball, F.; Trapman, P. (2020): A mathematical model reveals the influence of population heterogeneity on herd immunity to SARS-CoV-2, Tech. rep.
  • Brunson, E.K. (2013): The impact of social networks on parents’ vaccination decisions, Pediatrics, 131, e1397-e1404.
  • Cacioppo, S.; Capitanio, J.P.; Cacioppo, J.T. (2014): Toward a neurology of loneliness, Psychological bulletin, 140, 1464.
  • Chapman, G.B.; Li, M.; Colby, H.; Yoon, H. (2010): Opting in vs opting out of influenza vaccination, JAMA, 304, 43-44.
  • Charness, G.; gneezy, U. (2009): Incentives to exercise, Econometrica, 77, 909-931.
  • Dellavigna, S.; List, J.A.J.; Malmendier, U.; Rao, G. (2017): Voting to Tell Others, The Review of Economic Studies.
  • Duhigg, C. (2012): The power of habit: why we do what we do in life and business, Random House LLC.
  • Ellsberg, D. (1961): Risk, Ambiguity, and the Savage Axioms, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 75, 643-669.
  • Ferguson, N.M.; Laydon, D.; Nedjati-Gilani, G.; Imai, N.; Ainslie, K.; Baguelin, M.; Bhatia, S.; Boonyasiri, A.; Cucunubá, Z.; Cuomo-Dannenburg, G. (and others) (2020): Impact of non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) to reduce COVID-19 mortality and healthcare demand. Imperial College COVID-19 Response Team, Imperial College COVID-19 Response Team, p. 20.
  • Funk, P. (2010): Social incentives and voter turn- out: Evidence from the Swiss mail ballot System, Journal of the European Economic Association, 8, 1077-1103.
  • Gerber, A.S.; Green, D.P.; Larimer, C.W. (2008): Social pressure and voter turnout: Evidence from a large-scale field experiment, American Political Science Review, 102, 33-48.
  • Giné, X.; Karlan, D.; Zinman, J. (2010): Put your money where your butt is: a commitment contract for smoking cessation, American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, pp. 213-235.
  • Gittelsohn, J.; Lee, K. (2013): Integrating educational, environmental, and behavioral economic strategies may improve the effectiveness of obesity interventions, Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, 35, 52-68.
  • Gneezy, U.; Rustichini, A. (2000): A Fine Is a Price, The Journal of Legal Studies, 29, 1-17.
  • Guerrieri, V.; Lorenzoni, G.; Straub, L.; Werning, I. (2020): Macroeconomic implications of COVID-19: Can negative supply shocks cause demand shortages?, Tech. rep., National Bureau of Economic Research.
  • Halpern, S.D.; Miller, F.G. (2020): Cognitive Bias and Public Health Policy During the COVID-19 Pandemic, Annals of Internal Medicine, 2019, 2019-2020.
  • Hanks, A.S.; Just, D.R.; Smith, L.E.; Wansink, B. (2012): Healthy convenience: nudging students toward healthier choices in the lunchroom, Journal of public health, 34, 370-376.
  • Harvey, N. (2020): Behavioral Fatigue: Real Phenomenon, Naïve Construct, or Policy Contrivance?, Frontiers in Psychology, 11.
  • Haushofer, J.; Metcalf, J.C.E. (2020): Combining behavioral economics and infectious disease epidemiology to mitigate the COVID-19 outbreak, Princeton University, March, 6.
  • Holt-Lunstad, J.; Smith, T.B.; Baker, M.; Harris, T.; Stephenson, D. (2015): Loneliness and social isolation as risk factors for mortality: a meta-analytic review, Perspectives on psychological science, 10, 227-237.
  • Huettel, S.; Kranton, R. (2012): Identity economics and the brain: uncovering the mechanisms of social conflict, Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, 367, 680-91.
  • Huis, A.; Van Achterberg, T.; de Bruin, M.; Grol, R.; Schoonhoven, L.: Hulscher, M. (2012): A systematic review of hand hygiene improvement strategies: a behavioural approach, Implementation Science, 7, 1-14.
  • Hume, S.; John, P.; Sanders, M.; Stockdale, E. (2020): Nudge in the time of Coronavirus: The persistence of behavioural messages during crisis, Available at SSRN 3644165.
  • Jenni, K.; Loewenstein, G. (1997): Explaining the identifiable victim effect, Journal of Risk and uncertainty, 14, 235-257.
  • Johnson, E.J.; Goldstein, D. (2003): Do Defaults Save Lives?, Science, 302, 1338-1339.
  • Jonsen, A.R. (1986): Bentham in a box: technology assessment and health care allocation, Law, Medicine and Health Care, 14, 172-174.
  • Kahneman, D. (2011): Thinking, fast and slow, Macmillan.
  • Kahneman, D.; Tversky, A. (1979): Prospect theory: An analysis of decision under risk, Econometrica: Journal of the econometric society, pp. 263-291.
  • Kessler, J.B.; Zhang, C.Y. (2014): Behavioral Economics and Health, in Oxford Textbook of Public Health, Oxford Textbook of Public Health. Oxford Press.
  • Lunn, P.D.; Belton, C.A.; Lavin, C.; Mcgowan, F.P.; Timmons, S.; Robertson, D.A. (2020): Using Behavioral Science to help fight the Coronavirus, Journal of Behavioral Public Administration, 3.
  • Mckibbin, W.; Fernando, R. (2020): The global macroeconomic impacts of COVID19: Seven scenarios, Asian Economic Papers, pp. 1-55.
  • Milkman, K.L.; Beshears, J.; Choi, J.J.; Laibson, D.; Madrian, B.C. (2011): Using implementation intentions prompts to enhance influenza vaccination rates, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 108, 10415- 10420.
  • Milkman, K.L.; Minson, J.A.; Volpp, K.G.M. (2013): Holding the Hunger Games hostage at the gym: An evaluation of temptation bundling, Management science, 60, 283-299.
  • Montibeller, G.; Von Winterfeldt, D. (2015): Cognitive and motivational biases in decision and risk analysis, Risk analysis, 35, 1230-1251.
  • Moore, D.A.; Healy, P.J. (2008): The trouble with overconfidence, Psychological review, 115, 502.
  • O’Donoghue, T.; Rabin, M. (2015): Present bias: Lessons learned and to be learned, American Economic Review, 105, 273-279.
  • Oecd (2020): Regulatory policy and COVID-19: Behavioural insights for fast-paced decision making, Tech. Rep. November.
  • Olson, M.C. (1965): The Logic of Collective Action; Public Goods and the Theory of Groups, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA.
  • Paulos, J.A. (1988): Innumeracy: Mathematical illiteracy and its consequences, Macmillan.
  • Perry, C.; Chhatralia, K.; Damesick, D.; Hobden, S.; Volpe, L. (2015): Behavioural insights in health care, London: The Health Foundation, pp. 18-29.
  • Prem, K.; Liu, Y.; Russell, T.W.; Kucharski, A.J.; Eggo, R.m.; Davies, N.; Flasche, S.; Clifford, S.; Pearson, C.A.; Munday, J.D.; Abbott, S.; Gibbs, H.; Rosello, A.; Quilty, B.J.; Jombart, T.; Sun, F.; Diamond, C.; Gimma, A.; Van Zandvoort, K.; Funk, S.; Jarvis, C.I.; Edmunds, W.J.; Bosse, N.I.; Hellewell, J.; Jit, M.; Klepac, P. (2020): The effect of control strategies to reduce social mixing on outcomes of the COVID-19 epidemic in Wuhan, China: a modelling study, The Lancet Public Health, 5, e261-e270.
  • Randolph, H.E.; Barreiro, L.B. (2020): Herd Immunity: Understanding COVID-19, Immunity, 52, 737-741.
  • Roberto, C.A.; Kawachi, I. (2016): Behavioral Economics and Public Health, Oxford University Press.
  • Rolls, B.J.; Roe, L.S.; Meengs, J.S. (2006): Larger portion sizes lead to a sustained increase in energy intake over 2 days, Journal of the American Dietetic Association, 106, 543-549.
  • Rosenbaum, L. (2021): Escaping catch-22 overcoming covid vaccine hesitancy.
  • Rozin, P.; Scott, s.; Dingley, M.; Urbanek, J.K.; Jiang, H.; Kaltenbach, M. (2011): Nudge to nobesity I: Minor changes in accessibility decrease food intake, Judgment and Decision Making, 6, 323-332.
  • Sacarny, A.; Barnett, M.l.; Le, J.; Tetkoski, F.; Yokum, D.; Agrawal, S. (2018): Effect of peer comparison letters for high-volume primary care prescribers of quetiapine in older and disabled adults: a randomized clinical trial, JAMA psychiatry, 75, 1003-1011.
  • Samuelson, P.A. (1954): The Pure Theory of Public Expenditure, The Review of Economics and Statistics, 36, 387-389.
  • Sibony, A.-L. (2020): The UK COVID-19 response: A behavioural irony?, European Journal of Risk Regulation, 11, 350-357.
  • Soofi, M.; Najafi, F.; Karami-Matin, B. (2020): Using Insights from Behavioral Economics to Mitigate the Spread of COVID-19, Applied Health Economics and Health Policy, 18, 345-350.
  • Thaler, R.H.; Sunstein, C.R. (2008): Nudge: Improving decisions about health, wealth, and happiness, Yale University Press.
  • Thorndike, A.N.; Sonnenberg, L.; Riis, J.; BarrAclough, S.; Levy, D.E. (2012): A 2-phase labeling and choice architecture intervention to improve healthy food and beverage choices, American Journal of Public Health, 102, 527-533.
  • Tversky, A.; Kahneman, D. (1974): Judgment under uncertainty: Heuristics and biases, science, 185, 1124-1131.
  • Tversky, A.; Kahneman, D. (1991): Loss aversion in riskless choice: A reference-dependent model, The quarterly journal of economics, 106, 1039-1061.
  • Van Bavel, J.J.; Boggio, P.; Capraro, V.; Cichocka, A.; Cikara, M.; Crockett, M.; Crum, A.; Douglas, K.; Druckman, J.; Drury, J. (and others) (2020): Using social and behavioural science to support COVID-19 pandemic response, PsyArXiv. March, 24.
  • Volpp, K.G.; Loewenstein, G.; Troxel, A.B.; Doshi, J.; Price, M.; Laskin, M.; Kimmel, S.E. (2008): A test of financial incentives to improve warfarin adherence., BMC health services research, 8, 272.
  • Wadman, M. (2020): Public needs to prep for vaccine side effects, Science, 370, 1022.
  • World Health Organization (2020): Behavioural considerations for acceptance and uptake of COVID-19 vaccines: WHO technical advisory group on behavioural insights and sciences for health, meeting report, 15 October 2020.