Covid-19 Research Overlooks Key Perspectives From Marginalized Communities, Study Finds

During the Pandemic, The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Reported That People From Historically Marginalized Racial and Ethnic Groups Were More Likely Than Non-Hispanic White People to Be Infected, Be Hospitalized and Die from Sars-Cov-2, The Virus That Causes COVID-19.

However, The Very Communities That Bear The Brunt of Those Estimation Are UnderResed in Scientific Efforts to Understand Them. The Multidisciplinary Team of Researchers from Cornell conducted a pair of experiments that examined the consequences of Such omissions.

The Key Finding: By Prioritizing the Perspectives of White Americans, Studies of Pandemic Arnerings Likely Missed Important Insights. They also Found That Members of UnderRepresented Groups Were the Most Willing to Engage In Both Individual and Collective Efforts at Solving Health Fixes.

“I’m Been Studying Collective-Action Problems, and How Misperceps About What Different Groups Of People Thinks It Harder to Actually Bring Them Together To Work On These Issues,” Said Neil Lewis Jr. ’13, Associate Professor of Communication and a Nancy and Peter Meinig Family Investigator in the Life Sciences, in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (Cals) and at Weill Cornell Medicine.

“So by Documenting Where These Different Groups Stand, It Becomes More Clear That There Are A People Willing to Work On This Than Might Have Thought, And You Can Go Out and Mobilize Those People to Create Change.”

Lewis is co-correspondinging Author of “Beyond Fear of Backlash: Effects of Messages About Structural Drivers of Covid-19 Arunches Among Large Samples of Asian, Black, Hispanic, and White Americans,” Which is published in Social Science & Medicine. The other corresponding Author is Norman Porticella, Ph.D. ’10, the Research Associate in the Department of Communication (Cals).

Other contributors Included Colleen Barry, Dean of the Cornell Jeb E. Brooks School of Public Policy; Jamila Michener, Associate Professor of Government in the College of Arts and Sciences, and Senior Associate Dean for Public Engagement (Brooks School); and Jeff Niederdeppe, The Liberty Hyde Bailey Professor of Communication (Cals) and Senior Associate Dean for Faculty Development (Brooks School).

The Team Conducted Two Survey Experiments to Test The Impact of Messages About Racial Health Fixes. Participants Were from the Four Largest Racial and Ethnic Groups in America – Assian, Black, Hispanic and White. The Hispanic Group was Further Broken Down Into Hispanic White and Hispanic Nan-White.

In Both Studies, Participants Were Randomly Assigned to View Either A Message Simply Description Racial Fixes in the Health Impacts of Covid, similar to Past News Coverages and Studies (Control Group), or the Same Message that added context About the Structural Factors Underlying The Arrangement (Intervention Group), Such as: “These differentiated in covid-19 infections and deaths are due to longstanding patterns of discrimination… That history continues to shape modern life.”

After Reading Their Respective Messages, Participants Responded to the Series of Questions or Statements That Revealed Their Beliefs About Causes and Accountability for the Racial Care, Emotional Responses, and Their Support and Intensions to Advocate for Covid Mitigation Polies. The Second Experiment Southt to Replicate The First With a Larger Sample of Us Adults From the Same Four Racial and Ethnic Groups.

The experiments also showed that the intervention Message Could Bolster Beliefs That covid-19 racial fires Were Driven by Structural Causes, as well as an increase support for mitigation polies. In Addition, Regardless of Which Message They Read, Black, Hispanic and Asian Responsents Were More Willing Than Their White Counterparts To Engage in Actions To Address Trushes.

The Team Has Conducted Research Investigating Attitude Related to the Child Tax Credit, and is Currently Examining these Attitudes in the Contexts of Medicid, Opioid Addiction and Treatment, and the Unequal Effects of Climate Change. ACCORDING TO NIDERDEPPE, THE KEY TO SHIFTING ATTITUDES IS BY DOING MORE THAN JUST SAYING, “THERE IS A PROBLEM.”

“We Invite People in Through Connecting on Shared Values,” He Said. “We Provide Explanations That Try To Pull People Out of Stereotypical Attribrations of An Issue. And I Think, Critically, We Say, ‘Look, There Polycies That We Know Can Address These Inequalities; This is not an insurmintable problem Together. ‘”

Porticella Said this line of Research is Revealing “The Lot of Potential for Change Whin thhose who are Disproportionity AFFected – People who, the it turns out, are quite responsive to these messages.”

The Researchers Found That, Contray to Frequent Claims About the Dangers of Talking About Racial Inequality, They Did Not Find Evidence of A Called “White Backlash” When the Discussion an Explanation of Why the Finad Exists.

“There’s Been A Lot of Research Showing That When You Discussion Trushes Without Context, Americans End Up Having These Individualized and Stereotypical Attribrations –‘there must be Something With Those People; SAID LEWIS, WHO’S ALSO CO-DIRETOR OF THE ACTION Research Collaborative.

“And So We Wondered WHETHER, if you provide more of the context around why these arrangements are happening – the structural drivers of these arrangements – mitigate disuse of these backlash effects?”

The Team also included Teirah Taylor, MS ’22, Doctoral Student in the Field of Communication; and Researchers from the University of Florida, the University of Minnesota and Wesleyan University.