Rieger Marc Oliver
Department IV, University of Trier, Trier, Germany.
Front Sociol. 2020 Aug 20;5:61. doi: 10.3389/fsoc.2020.00061. eCollection 2020.
In a survey among 250 subjects recruited at a German university and predominantly university students, we elicit opinions about social distancing, i. e., the necessity to keep away from other people to slow down the speed of the ongoing SARS-CoV-2 epidemics. The good news is that most students are supportive to it. A minority, however, does not completely agree. We find that how many elderly persons subjects knew personally, was the most significant factor for their attitudes toward social distancing. We also found a significant negative impact of believe in conspiracy theories on these attitudes. These theories have a non-negligible number of proponents, even among university students. Moreover, a certain degree of mistrust to media is widespread (around a third of the subjects). To improve positive attitudes to social distancing and thus to improve compliance we recommend therefore to emphasize relations of persons to elderly people in health communications more and to continue fighting against fake news and conspiracy theories regarding SARS-CoV-2.
在一项对德国一所大学招募的250名受试者（主要是大学生）进行的调查中，我们征集了他们对社交距离的看法，即与他人保持距离以减缓正在进行的SARS-CoV-2疫情传播速度的必要性。好消息是，大多数学生对此表示支持。然而，少数学生并不完全同意。我们发现，受试者个人认识的老年人数量是他们对社交距离态度的最重要因素。我们还发现，相信阴谋论对这些态度有显著的负面影响。即使在大学生中，这些理论也有相当数量的支持者。此外，对媒体的某种程度的不信任很普遍（约三分之一的受试者）。因此，为了提高对社交距离的积极态度并从而提高依从性，我们建议在健康传播中更多地强调人们与老年人的关系，并继续打击有关SARS-CoV-2的虚假新闻和阴谋论。
