Creighton Mathew, Capistrano Daniel, Sorokowska Agnieszka, Sorokowski Piotr
School of Sociology, University College, Dublin, Ireland.
School of Education, University College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland.
Spat Demogr. 2022;10(1):107-116. doi: 10.1007/s40980-021-00100-y. Epub 2021 Oct 13.
Subsequent to the arrival of SARS-CoV-2 and emergence of COVID-19, policy to limit the further spread has focused on increasing distance between individuals when interacting, often termed social distancing although physical distancing is more accurate (Das Gupta and Wong in Canadian J Public Health 111:488-489, 2020; Gale in Is 'social distancing' the wrong term? Expert prefers 'physical distancing,' and the WHO agrees. The Washington Post, 2020; Sørensen et al. in Glob Health Promot, 28:5-14, 2021), and limiting the frequency of interaction by limiting/prohibiting non-essential and large-scale social gatherings. This research note focuses on social spacing, defined by distance and interaction, to offer a cross-cultural insight into social distancing and social interactions in the pre-pandemic period. Combining unique data on frequency of contact, religious service attendance and preferred interpersonal spacing in 20 countries, this research note considers variation in the extent to which physical distance was already practiced without official recommendations and underscores notable cross-cultural variation in the extent to which social interaction occurred. Results suggest that policy intervention should emphasize certain behavioral changes based on pre-existing context-specific patterns of interaction and interpersonal spacing rather than a one-size-fits-all approach. This research note is a descriptive first step that allows unique insight into social spacing and contact prior to the spread of SARS-CoV-2. It provides a baseline typology and a reference for future work on the cross-cultural implications of COVID-19 for pre-pandemic socio-cultural practice and vice versa.
在严重急性呼吸综合征冠状病毒2（SARS-CoV-2）出现并引发2019冠状病毒病（COVID-19）之后，为限制病毒进一步传播所采取的政策重点在于，在人们互动时增加彼此之间的距离，这一做法通常被称为社交距离，不过物理距离这一表述更为准确（达斯·古普塔和黄在《加拿大公共卫生杂志》2020年第111卷第488 - 489页；盖尔在“‘社交距离’这个词是否有误？专家更倾向于‘物理距离’，世界卫生组织也认同这一点。《华盛顿邮报》，2020年；索伦森等人在《全球健康促进》2021年第28卷第5 - 14页），以及通过限制/禁止非必要的大规模社交聚会来减少互动频率。本研究报告聚焦于由距离和互动所定义的社交间距，以便对疫情前时期的社交距离和社交互动进行跨文化洞察。通过整合20个国家关于接触频率、宗教活动参与情况以及偏好的人际间距的独特数据，本研究报告考察了在没有官方建议的情况下人们已经践行物理距离的程度差异，并强调了社交互动程度方面显著的跨文化差异。结果表明，政策干预应基于先前特定情境下的互动模式和人际间距，强调某些行为改变，而不是采取一刀切的方法。本研究报告是描述性的第一步，能够让我们对严重急性呼吸综合征冠状病毒2传播之前的社交间距和接触情况有独特的洞察。它为未来关于2019冠状病毒病对疫情前社会文化实践的跨文化影响以及反之情况的研究提供了一个基线类型学和参考。
