Partisan patterns of compliance with public health measures are a feature of early COVID‐19 responses. In many cases, these differences in behaviour relate to pre‐existing group identities. However, in times of rapid societal change, novel opinion‐based groups can emerge and provide a new basis for partisan identification and divergent collective behaviour. Here, we use network methods to map the emergence of opposing opinion‐based groups and assess their implications for public health behaviour. In a longitudinal study, we tracked public health attitudes and self‐reported behaviour in a sample of UK participants over four time points. Network visualisation reveal a rift in attitudinal alignment over time and the genesis of two distinct groups characterised by trust, or distrust, in science (Study 1a; N = 253). These groups also diverge in public health behaviour. In a brief follow‐up study (N = 206), we find that this opinion polarization partially reflects underlying societal divides. We discuss implications for opinion‐based group research and public health campaigns.

中文翻译：

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用态度网络绘制公共卫生应对措施：英国早期 COVID-19 应对阶段基于意见的团体的出现。


遵守公共卫生措施的党派模式是早期 COVID-19 应对措施的一个特点。在许多情况下，这些行为差异与预先存在的群体身份有关。然而，在社会快速变革的时代，新的基于意见的群体可能会出现，并为党派认同和不同的集体行为提供新的基础。在这里，我们使用网络方法来绘制反对意见群体的出现情况，并评估其对公共卫生行为的影响。在一项纵向研究中，我们跟踪了英国参与者样本在四个时间点的公共卫生态度和自我报告行为。网络可视化揭示了随着时间的推移，态度一致的裂痕以及两个以信任或不信任为特征的不同群体在科学上的起源（研究 1a； N = 253）。这些群体在公共卫生行为方面也存在差异。在一项简短的后续研究（ N = 206）中，我们发现这种意见两极分化部分反映了潜在的社会分歧。我们讨论了对基于意见的团体研究和公共卫生运动的影响。