Thread by @AnthonyLeeZhang

One thing ex-post kind of puzzling. In the US, there seems to have been much more public skepticism/outrage/distrust about mask-wearing, compared to vaccination

This is interesting because:

1. Masks, whether they are useful or not, are not new, and obviously not harmful
2. The vaccine is totally new science

You might think the American population's opposition towards 1. is driven by anti-science sentiment or something. It is then puzzling that ppl have been so willing to embrace 2., with (afaik) so little backlash/conspiracy theory/etc surrounding it

Some hypotheses about where the difference in public opinion/perspectives of masks and vaccination arise from:

Messaging: Trump + some of the public health establishment were anti-mask to begin with, creating a lot of confusion. Messaging about vaccination has been comparatively smooth and unified-front

Salience: ppl get into big fights about masks, because you can tell by looking at someone whether they're wearing a mask or not. Comparatively harder to pick fights with people who have gotten vaccinated.

(Also, masks are required for entry into various shops, etc. but we haven't yet gotten to the point where proofs of vaccination are useful anywhere? When they become useful, the public fights about vaccine requirements will likely start)

Or to put it in other words. The fact that there is a lot more public conflict over a very old tech - masks - rel. to a very new tech - vaccines - suggests that something other than "scientific new-ness" is driving this conflict

This is interesting because public science skepticism seems then to depart substantially from scientific-Bayesianism. Suggesting stuff like messaging, salience, etc. then have a surprisingly high capacity to shape the public's attitude towards science

This was pretty salient to me as there was a "If you have ever ___ you shouldn't worry about what's in the vaccine" memes going around... but there's been surprisingly little worry about taking the vaccine, as far as I've seen

I guess another element is the game theory is a bit different. Masking is a bit of a prisoner's dilemma: wear a mask and you have to keep wearing a mask until the whole thing is over, if no one else is wearing

Whereas vaccination is almost dominant-strategy incentive compatible. Get vaccinated, and the pandemic is essentially over for you, regardless of whether others vaccinate

And another point: if you think the mask debacle was partly due to mixed messaging burning the govt's credibility early on. It is surprising how transient that effect was. You could imagine ppl, after the mask issues, losing trust in the govt and refusing the take the vaccine

Instead people seem generally trusting of the govt as to what is in the vaccine, as well as how it's distributed, etc. So the loss of trust associated with masks stuff seems surprisingly short-term and localized