I learned this story in one of my Informatics class: A 2-year "water boiling" campaign was conducted in Peru in order to improve local residents' health. A public health worker gave talks to housewives, telling them how boiling water could kill germs, but largely failed to persuade them to drink boiling water. Can you think of why that is?
When I told friends and classmates that I've been wearing face coverings in public spaces since February this year, nobody seemed surprised now. Being one of the first people wearing face coverings due to the pandemic in a medium city in the midwest was not that easy.
I've been keeping my guards out for 7 months. When we first started hearing news about the virus in China in January, people around me would say, "hope your friends and family are okay." I was mostly worried about my parents in Beijing at that time, but a month later, they had started worrying about me more. I was fairly educated about the importance of face coverings.
So, even though mask-wearing was deemed unnecessary and may lead to discrimination in the U.S. in Febrary, I bravely wore my coverings at work, in grocery stores, and during uber rides. (Surprisingly, nobody commented about it or gave me weird looks, at least not in front of me. Maybe they did, and I just ignored them. One of my uber drivers, who was probably 60+, said that he was not afraid of getting the virus. My interpretation of his words is that he would accept his destiny if he got it.)
For the city I was living in, it wasn't until May when almost everyone would wear face coverings in public spaces. More people started caring about it. To be honest, I am not surprised that it took this long - this corresponds to Rogers' theory of diffusion of innovation (Rogers, 2003): "Diffusion is the process by which an innovation is communicated through certain channels over time among members of a social system."
According to this theory, the spread of new information (lifestyle) cannot happen without 1) an innovation; 2) communication; 3) channels over time. Well, wearing masks for COVID is not an innovation. But it is an unusual action that people have to take and a new lifestyle to which people will adapt. The wide spread of disease due to carelessness, is possibly significantly affected by the lack of effective communication.
Lack of effective communication example: On Sep 9, media reported that "Trump said in a taped interview that he deliberately downplayed the danger of the coronavirus in public early this year even though he knew it posed a deadly threat to Americans."
Eventually, the new norm of mask-wearing channeled over time among residents of the city I live in. Like everywhere else, there are different kinds of adopters. According to Rogers, there are:
Innovators who are educated, risk takers, and have many information sources
Early adopters who are leaders, opinion leaders, and educated
Early majority who has large networks of friends and acquaintances
Late majority who are cautious, somewhat conservative, and tend to have lower economic status
Laggards who are the other risk aversive people
I was one of the early adopters. I did what I could to justify the action of mask-wearing. Persuading my boyfriend to weak masks took me a week. Without the guidance and protection of opinion leaders, innovation could be adopted in a extremely slow rate.
Fortunately, the innovation did not fail as much as the water boiling story. Analysis gave three explanations for the innovation's failure:
The innovation (drinking boiling water) challenged the local culture that only the sick should drink hot water;
The worker worked with the "wrong" housewives - they have little influence on the community;
The approach was not client-oriented - it didn't take into account the challenges of the villagers.
Adoption of new technology (new lifestyle, new actions... etc.) hinges on several factors, with diffusion being the most important. A little action could have big rippling effects. When it reaches critical mass - a volume that reaches a size to create an impact - further diffusion becomes self-sustaining. This is usually used in marketing - heavy advertisement and the use of opinion leaders make more people aware of the product.
It takes a long time for new things to be adopted. If you want to promote your innovation, you have to be smart about it.
Reference
Rogers, E. (2003). Diffusion of innovations. New York, NY: Free Press. (Excerpts – 35 pages)
新冠病毒流行和信息传播理论
我在我的一次信息学课上学到了这个故事：秘鲁一个地方进行了为期2年的“烧开水”活动，想以此改善当地居民的健康。一名公共卫生工作者访问了许多家庭主妇，告诉她们开水如何杀死细菌，但他未能说服很多家庭喝烧开的水。你能想到这是为什么吗？
当我近期告诉我的朋友和同学，我从今年2月开始在公共场所戴口罩时，似乎没有人感到惊讶。在美国中西部一个中等大小的城市，作为第一批戴口罩的人并不容易。
我已经隔离防疫了7个月。一月份，当我们第一次开始听到有关病毒的新闻时，我周围的人会说：“希望您的朋友和家人都没事。”那时，我最担心的是我在北京的父母，但是一个月后，他们开始更加担心我。经历过非典的我们深知口罩的重要性。
因此，即使当时戴口罩被认为是不必要的，并且在可能会被针对，但我还是勇敢地在工作单位，杂货店和uber时佩戴。 （令人惊讶的是，没有人对此发表评论或给我怪异的表情，至少没有在我面前。也许有，我忽略了他们。我的一位60岁以上的uber司机说，他不害怕感染病毒。我理解的他的意思是，如果他不幸得了，他将接受命运。）
对于我所居住的城市，直到5月份，几乎每个人都在公共场所戴上了口罩。更多的人开始关心新冠流行病。老实说，我对此并不感到惊讶-这与罗杰斯（Rogers, 2003）的创新扩散理论相对应。
根据这一理论，新信息（或新生活方式）的传播离不开1）创新； 2）沟通； 3）随着时间的推移。好吧，为COVID戴口罩并不是一项创新。但这是人们必须采取的不寻常的行动，也是人们将适应的新生活方式。病毒在美国的广泛传播是被非有效沟通严重影响的。
非有效的沟通示例：9月9日，媒体报道说：“有录音带证明，特朗普在接受采访时说，他早在年初就知道新冠对将美国人构成致命威胁，但他在公众面前隐瞒冠状病毒的危害指数。”
最终，随着时间的推移，我所居住的城市出现了人人戴口罩的新常态。像其他地方一样，信息接受群体有很多种。据罗杰斯，这包括：
受过教育的创新者，他们愿意冒险并拥有许多信息源
早期采纳者，他们通常是受过教育的意见领袖
早期多数，拥有众多朋友和熟人
晚期多数，持谨慎态度，比较保守，经济地位较低
其余的落后者，也是风险厌恶者
我应是早期采纳者之一。我尽我所能证明戴口罩的行为是合理的。说服我的男朋友戴上口罩花了我一个星期。没有公众领导者的指导和保护，新事物的接纳速度非常缓慢。
幸运的是，这项创新并没有像文章开头的秘鲁烧开水活动一样失败。有分析为烧开水的故事提供了三种解释：
这项创新（饮用开水）挑战了当地的文化，即当地人认为只有病人才能喝热水。
工作人员试图改变的家庭主妇是『错误』的 - 这些家庭主妇在社区的影响力不大，不能让更多人接受引用开水；
工作人员的引导方法没有为客户考虑 - 它没有考虑到烧开水这个看似简单的事情对村民的日常生活的挑战。
采用新技术（新生活方式，新行为等）取决于好几个因素，其中传播最为重要。小的动作可能会产生很大的涟漪效应。罗杰斯的理论认为，当达到临界质量时，进一步的扩散就可以自我维持。这通常用于市场营销中-大量投放广告以及舆论领袖推广可以使更多的人意识到产品。
让人们接纳、采用新事物需要很长时间。如果你想成为信息传播者，方法就必须聪明。