Weather and Lockdown Compliance

32 Pages Posted: 22 Jun 2021

See all articles by Michael Ganslmeier

Michael Ganslmeier

London School of Economics and Political Science

Jonathan Van Parys

YouGov Deutschland AG

Tim Vlandas

London School of Economics & Political Science (LSE) - European Institute

Date Written: June 12, 2021

Abstract

The effectiveness of containment measures depends on both epidemiological and sociological mechanisms, most notably compliance with national lockdown rules. Yet, there is growing discontent with social distancing rules in many countries, which is expected to intensify further during summer. Using a highly granular dataset on compliance of over 105,000 individuals in the United Kingdom (UK), we find that compliance with lockdown policies tends to be high in the overall population, but that specific segments of society are substantially less compliant. Our findings show that warmer temperatures decrease non-compliance with governmental guidelines of individuals who are male, divorced, part-time employed, and/or parent of more than two children. Thus, as long as heard immunity through vaccination is not achieved and new strains demand containment measures to remain in place, understanding the individual determinants of non-compliance behaviour in different seasons of the year will remain important for policymakers to design effective policies in the future.

Keywords: Covid-19, pandemic, UK, lockdown, compliance, social distancing

Suggested Citation

Ganslmeier, Michael and Van Parys, Jonathan and Vlandas, Tim, Weather and Lockdown Compliance (June 12, 2021). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3865699 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3865699

Michael Ganslmeier

London School of Economics and Political Science ( email )

Houghton Street
London, WC2A 2AE
United Kingdom

Jonathan Van Parys

YouGov Deutschland AG ( email )

Gustav-Heinemann-Ufer 72
Cologne, 50968
Germany

Tim Vlandas (Contact Author)

London School of Economics & Political Science (LSE) - European Institute

Oxford, Oxfordshire OX2
United Kingdom

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