Political Attitudes and Behavior in a Pandemic: Factors Affecting Compliance with COVID-19 Policies

The ongoing COVID-19 public health crisis provides a unique opportunity to examine the role that public opinion plays in policy efficacy. More specifically, what factors contribute to different policy outcomes within the population? Governments and institutions at all levels have sought to incentivize compliance behavior utilizing different approaches. Statistical models were used to examine the relationship between attitudes and behaviors within the United States in this context. Trust is the primary focus in this paper because of its role in a public health crisis with consideration for rules and norms of social interaction. The analysis herein shows that social trust is a significant consideration for policy-related outcomes while political trust is not. Additionally, ideology and attitudes supporting coronavirus policy provide some explanatory power when all components were factored into the final modeling.