To App or not to App? Understanding public resistance to COVID-19 digital contact tracing and its criminological relevance
To App or not to App? Understanding public resistance to COVID-19 digital contact tracing and its criminological relevance
In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, digital contact tracing has been developed and promoted in many countries as a valuable tool to help the fight against the virus, allowing health authorities to react quickly and limit contagion. Very often, however, these tracing apps have faced public resistance, making their use relatively sparse and ineffective. Our study relies on an interdisciplinary approach that brings together criminological and computational expertise to consider the key social dynamics underlying people’s resistance to using the NHS contact-tracing app in England and Wales. The present study analyses a large Twitter dataset to investigate interactions between relevant user accounts and identify the main narrative frames (lack of trust and negative liberties) and mechanisms (polluted information, conspiratorial thinking and reactance) to explain resistance towards use of the NHS contact-tracing app. Our study builds on concepts of User eXperience (UX) and algorithm aversion and demonstrates the relevance of these elements to the key criminological problem of resistance to official technologies.
28-45
Lavorgna, Anita
6e34317e-2dda-42b9-8244-14747695598c
Ugwudike, Pamela
2faf9318-093b-4396-9ba1-2291c8991bac
Carr, Leslie
0572b10e-039d-46c6-bf05-57cce71d3936
Benitez, Yadira Sanchez
379f893e-226e-4df1-99a6-2d30b979057c
Rekha, Gopala Sasie
9efb56db-3c5c-449f-b340-e2c99b20d34c
8 November 2021
Lavorgna, Anita
6e34317e-2dda-42b9-8244-14747695598c
Ugwudike, Pamela
2faf9318-093b-4396-9ba1-2291c8991bac
Carr, Leslie
0572b10e-039d-46c6-bf05-57cce71d3936
Benitez, Yadira Sanchez
379f893e-226e-4df1-99a6-2d30b979057c
Rekha, Gopala Sasie
9efb56db-3c5c-449f-b340-e2c99b20d34c
Lavorgna, Anita, Ugwudike, Pamela, Carr, Leslie, Benitez, Yadira Sanchez and Rekha, Gopala Sasie
(2021)
To App or not to App? Understanding public resistance to COVID-19 digital contact tracing and its criminological relevance.
Law, Technology and Humans, 3 (2), .
(doi:10.5204/lthj.2012).
Abstract
In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, digital contact tracing has been developed and promoted in many countries as a valuable tool to help the fight against the virus, allowing health authorities to react quickly and limit contagion. Very often, however, these tracing apps have faced public resistance, making their use relatively sparse and ineffective. Our study relies on an interdisciplinary approach that brings together criminological and computational expertise to consider the key social dynamics underlying people’s resistance to using the NHS contact-tracing app in England and Wales. The present study analyses a large Twitter dataset to investigate interactions between relevant user accounts and identify the main narrative frames (lack of trust and negative liberties) and mechanisms (polluted information, conspiratorial thinking and reactance) to explain resistance towards use of the NHS contact-tracing app. Our study builds on concepts of User eXperience (UX) and algorithm aversion and demonstrates the relevance of these elements to the key criminological problem of resistance to official technologies.
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LTHJ_ AppProject
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2012-Article Text-8218-1-10-20211102
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Accepted/In Press date: 8 October 2021
Published date: 8 November 2021
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Local EPrints ID: 451954
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/451954
PURE UUID: 7139d74e-0e6f-402d-9424-8ff4cd78a256
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Date deposited: 04 Nov 2021 17:32
Last modified: 16 Apr 2025 02:17
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Author:
Yadira Sanchez Benitez
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