Predicting the Variations of Anti-Asian Attack across U.S. during the COVID-19 Pandemic with Socio-structural and Cultural Factors

ABSTRACT

With the outbreaks of the COVID-19 pandemic, anti-Asian attacks and hate crimes have burgeoned in many areas of the United States. It is obvious that the emerging of anti-Asian attacks was not geographically evenly distributed. To elucidate the underlying causes of hate crimes against American Asians, we utilized the archival and pandemic data to establish the model to predict the variations in anti-Asian attacks across the 50 U.S. states. Several indicators, i.e., real GDP per capita, unpredictable environment, unemployment rates of African-Americans and Latinos, honor culture, and COVID-19 severity, together predicted the statewide differences in anti-Asian attacks of U.S. with the explanatory power of 96.8%. Finally, the implications of findings are discussed. © 2021 IEEE