How National Culture Influences the Speed of COVID-19 Spread: Three Cross-Cultural Studies

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Uncertainty avoidance is defined as "the extent to which the members of a society feel threatened by ambiguous and unknown situations" (198). It is examined in studies 1 and 2. Study 1: Uncertainty avoidance is tested against the length (in days) of each phase, the average daily cases of each phase, and the average daily case growth rate for each phase. The relationship between uncertainty avoidance and number of days was significant for phase 1 (coefficient= -.64, p<.05), phase 2 (coefficient= -.73, p<.05), and phase 13 (coefficient=4.00, p<.01)(wrong direction). The relationship between uncertainty avoidance and average daily cases was significant for phase 2 (coefficient=1.65, p<.1), phase 3 (coefficient=3.27, p<.1), and phase 6 (coefficient=5.55, p<.1). The relationship between uncertainty avoidance and average daily case growth was significant for phase 1 (coefficient=.38, p<.05), phase 3 (coefficient=.15, p<.1), and phase 7 (coefficient=.09, p<.1). This indicates that uncertainty avoidance had a positive effect on COVID-19 spread for the entry, take-off, and growth phases of the pandemic. Study 2: Uncertainty avoidance is tested against the length (in days) of each phase, the average daily cases of each phase, and the average daily case growth rate for each phase. The relationship between uncertainty avoidance and number of days was significant only for phase 5 (coefficient= -8.01, p<.1). The relationship between uncertainty avoidance and average daily cases was significant for phase 1 (coefficient=45.37, p<.05), phase 3 (coefficient=209.72, p<.1), and phase 4 (coefficient=518.54, p<.05). The relationship between uncertainty avoidance and average daily case growth was significant for phase 3 (coefficient=8.57, p<.1) and phase 4 (coefficient=20.14, p<.05). This corroborates the results of study 1.