“Friendly Shield” Effect: Why People Believe Affections Will Protect Them From COVID

As coronavirus infections cease around the world, health restrictions have been relaxed, although the use of masks remains indoors in most countries, many cities and nations have ended social distancing as we have conceived it for the past two years: two meters away is no longer an everyday habit.

However, the COVID-19 pandemic is not over yet, and in addition, other infectious diseases, such as the flu caused by the influenza virus, have reappeared strongly in recent months. That is why epidemiology experts continue to insist on maintaining sanitary hygiene measures to prevent further outbreaks and the circulation of other viruses. Faced with this, how to avoid getting infected and infecting others?

People may feel more protected and take fewer safety precautions about COVID-19 when they are with their friends, or even when they only think about them, rather than acquaintances or strangers, according to research published by the American Psychological Association .

Friendship, while psychologically beneficial, can distort a person's perception of risk. During the two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, many people have become accustomed to spending time with their closest social circle, which can have unintended consequences, said study authors Hyunjung Crystal Lee, assistant professor of marketing, and Eline De Vries, associate professor of marketing at the Carlos III University of Madrid in Spain.

“Friends and family can provide a sense of protection, but it is irrational and dangerous to believe that they will protect you from COVID-19 infection. This trend we call the 'friendly shield effect' could intensify a false sense of security and contribute to future infections,” the authors of the research said. De Vries and Lee conducted five trials with US residents for the study that was published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied.

While there is some general perception about the decline in coronavirus infections, the situation is not the same worldwide, there are countries, such as China, that in recent weeks recorded record contagions since the start of the pandemic. “We are dealing with more than a million cases a day globally, that is not a small thing, for example Germany and the United Kingdom are experiencing significant waves of cases,” Dr. Ricardo Teijeiro, an infectiologist at the Hospital Pirovano and member of the Argentine Society of Infectology (SADI), told Infobae.

However, the current situation is not the same as in March 2020. Coronavirus vaccination coverage and increased scientific knowledge about SARS-CoV-2 place humanity in another scenario. “Care measures have changed, because you already know in the family or in the working group, who is vaccinated or who is at risk, and that obviously changes the level of protection,” Teijeiro said.

The paradox of intimacy

The study by Universidad Carlos III de Madrid also revealed that those who believe that they previously got COVID-19 from a friend or family member are less likely to think they will catch it again than those who were infected by an acquaintance or stranger.

“Limiting interactions to close friends and family is a common protective measure to reduce the risk of coronavirus transmission, but the study's findings show that this practice also unintentionally creates other problems, as people tend to perceive reduced health risks and engage in potentially hazardous activities,” the authors reported.

According to the researchers, the findings seem to be linked to what is known as the “paradox of intimacy”: the idea that those among whom we feel closest and most secure may, in fact, represent the greatest risk.

In a broader sense, infectiologists interpret a more complex situation: “The levels of protection against COVID are not the same as at the beginning of the pandemic, if we are all vaccinated the risk of serious illness is lower. It is not the same to travel by public transport where the level of risk is high and in addition, we do not know who received the doses against the coronavirus and who did not,” the infectiologist at Hospital Pirovano explained to Infobae and distinguished these situations from family meetings where you know the vaccination status and the pre-existing diseases of each member.

The research of the Spanish study

In an experiment with 495 participants, the Spanish team asked one group to write memories of a close friend while the other group wrote about a distant acquaintance. All participants then read an informative article indicating that unhealthy food may increase the risks of more severe symptoms of COVID-19, while the use of hand sanitizers, masks and disinfecting wipes can reduce the likelihood of infection.

Participants then chose a junk food item (candy bars or chips) or a health protection product (face mask, hand sanitizer, or disinfectant wipes) from an online store. Participants who wrote about a close friend were more likely to choose junk food rather than a health protection product than those who wrote about a distant acquaintance.

Another of the five experiments consisted of 109 participants who had previously been infected with COVID-19 and knew the source of their infection. Participants infected by friends or family were less likely to think they would become infected again than those previously infected by acquaintances or strangers.

In Argentina, one of the customs that eliminated the pandemic is the act of sharing mate. However, in gatherings of friends, relaxation in the face of COVID-19 caused some to resume the habit of sharing the infusion with close relatives. “It is one thing to share the mate with the partner, with whom one has intimate contact and sleeps in the same bed. But, for example, I don't share mate with my son because he is a young person who has social outlets and is more at risk of getting infected and transmitting the virus,” Teijeiro said.

Therefore, at this stage of the pandemic, the expert recommends assessing the risk conditions of each group, it is not the same young people with a complete vaccination and reinforcement scheme as an elderly person with risk conditions. However, care measures must be maintained, hand washing, the use of alcohol gel, the use of masks in closed environments, not only because of COVID-19, but also for the rest of the infectious diseases.

In the same vein, Dr. Bárbara Broese, head of Epidemiology at the Central Hospital of San Isidro Dr. Melchor Ángel Posse, told Infobae that “Argentines love two things: sharing mate and kissing or hugging each other when we greet each other, we must bear in mind that in these two situations there are very close of the entrance and exit gate of respiratory viruses that are the nose and mouth. That is why we must try to avoid these situations, especially at this time of year, when not only COVID-19 but other respiratory viruses such as influenza and rhinoviruses circulate.”

Professor Stephen Reicher, from the University of St. Andrews, United Kingdom, and a member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) which advises on behavioral science to the British government, did not participate in the new work but said the study added evidence to a long line of research that had reached similar conclusions.

“There is no moral judgment associated with being infected. Anyone can have COVID-19, whether they are a friend or an enemy, acquaintance or a stranger,” Reicher told The Guardian newspaper. “And, paradoxically, the more we assume that 'people like us' won't have the virus, the more likely we are to catch it.”

Based on these findings, the authors stated that public health campaigns COVID -19 should warn against the tendency of people to engage in less protective behavior when the risk of infection is associated with friends and family, even if only tangentially.

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