Broda Maximilian D, Borovska Petra, Kollenda Diana, Linka Marcel, de Haas Naomi, de Haas Samuel, de Haas Benjamin
Experimental Psychology, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Str 10F, 35394 Giessen, Germany.
Center for Mind, Brain and Behavior, Universities of Marburg, Giessen and Darmstadt, Hans-Meerwein-Strasse 6, 35032 Marburg, Germany.
PNAS Nexus. 2024 Jul 16;3(7):pgae283. doi: 10.1093/pnasnexus/pgae283. eCollection 2024 Jul.
The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has highlighted the importance of contact tracing for epidemiological mitigation. Contact tracing interviews (CTIs) typically rely on episodic memory, which is prone to decline over time. Here, we provide a quantitative estimate of reporting decline for age- and gender-representative samples from the United Kingdom and Germany, emulating >15,000 CTIs. We find that the number of reported contacts declines as a power function of recall delay and is significantly higher for younger subjects and for those who used memory aids, such as a scheduler. We further find that these factors interact with delay: Older subjects and those who made no use of memory aids have steeper decline functions. These findings can inform epidemiological modeling and policies in the context of infectious diseases.
严重急性呼吸综合征冠状病毒2（SARS-CoV-2）大流行凸显了接触者追踪对于缓解流行病学状况的重要性。接触者追踪访谈（CTIs）通常依赖情景记忆，而情景记忆容易随时间衰退。在此，我们对来自英国和德国的年龄及性别具有代表性的样本报告衰退情况进行了定量估计，模拟了超过15000次接触者追踪访谈。我们发现，报告的接触者数量随回忆延迟呈幂函数下降，且在年轻受试者以及使用了诸如日程安排器等记忆辅助工具的人群中下降幅度显著更高。我们还发现，这些因素与延迟存在相互作用：老年受试者以及未使用记忆辅助工具的人群的下降函数更为陡峭。这些发现可为传染病背景下的流行病学建模和政策提供参考。
