I’m not a public health educator, but I play one on social media. Maybe you do too. As the COVID-19 pandemic rages on, many people have found themselves serving as armchair epidemiologists and pundits, tracking the virus, projecting the future, and browbeating people who refuse to stay home or wear masks.
The vast majority of social media memes I’ve seen are terrific at validating the behavior of people who are already diligently masking and social distancing. But they are terrible at persuading skeptics to abide by public health precautions. Neuroscientist Emiliana Simon-Thomas says that people often lash out vitriolically when they perceive others as being insufficiently self-sacrificing, but she says that doing so triggers resistance. “People don’t appreciate being told what to do by someone they don’t know,” explains Simon-Thomas, science director of the University of California, Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center.
Being on the receiving end of unsolicited feedback can make people feel more entrenched and righteous about their behavior, especially if the feedback has a shaming quality. “[T]rying to shame people into healthy behavior generally doesn’t work,” Harvard epidemiologist Julia Marcus says, “and actually can make things worse.”
