Promoting Public Compliance through Information Disclosure: Effect of Disclosing Confirmed Cases’ Personal Information on Public Mobility During the COVID-19 Outbreak

Abstract

Governments often disclose pandemic-related information to reduce public mobility behavior during the initial outbreak stage of a pandemic like COVID-19. Previous studies have examined the effects of whether to disclose relevant information on public behavior but neglected the effects of information content. Based on the disclosed personal information of COVID-19 confirmed cases from 316 cities in China, we find that disclosing demographic information of confirmed cases does not affect public mobility, whereas disclosing their infection traceability information increases public mobility and trajectory range information decreases public mobility. We also find a U-shaped effect of information diversity on public mobility behavior.