Social norm dynamics in a behavioral epidemic model

Abstract: Understanding the social determinants that influence the adoption of preventive measures during a disease outbreak is crucial for building effective epidemic models and hence for policy making. While traditional behavioral epidemic models focused on rational decision-making, psychological biases and the incorporation of simple imitation-based mechanisms to account for social influence, recent experimental studies highlight the necessity of considering the role of social norm dynamics. Here, we develop a behavioral epidemic model on a multilayer network, by integrating an Experience Weighted Attractor (EWA) learning mechanism with the dynamics of social norms. The resulting decision making process, can potentially lead to a boost in vaccination coverage and hence to a significantly reduced final infected fraction, offering an alternative social mechanism to altruism that can achieve this. Furthermore, we examine the importance of the dynamics of each one of the social norms' types, injunctive or descriptive, in reducing the infected fraction, finding that the former have a more significant effect. We also explore the effect that external interventions on the dynamics of social norms can have on the expansion of an epidemic, aiming in identifying improved public communication protocols. Enhanced models of social norm dynamics, if validated and tested, can better capture the complexities of human social behavior and mitigate various societal challenges beyond pandemics.