Group loyalty and feelings about one’s country as predictors of compliance with emergency health protocol

The case of COVID-19 among Nigerians

Abstract

The emergence of COVID-2019, coupled with its rapid rate of transmission, necessitated the placement of restrictions on human behaviours. The restrictions received varying degrees of resistance across the world. Previous studies pointed at the possibility that culture can explain the differences in resistance, and collectivism has been used substantially as a unitary construct to explain the differences. However, collectivism is a broad concept, encompassing loosely related values. Consequently, the actual role of each of the collectivism-related values in the compliance behaviour remains unknown. We isolated group loyalty and feelings about one’s country and examined their influence on compliance with the COVID-19 protocol. Data were collected online and were analysed with hierarchical regression technique. The result revealed a positive relationship between group loyalty and compliance with the COVID-19 protocol. Females complied more than males. Although feelings about one’s country had no direct significant influence on compliance, positive feelings and group loyalty had marginal significant interaction effect on compliance. Practitioners and policy makers can, therefore, leverage on the tenets of group loyalty in designing and implementing emergency health prevention measures, especially when the measures require significant personal sacrifices. Implications and limitations of the study as well as suggestions for further studies were discussed