Factors Influencing the Wearing of Masks Among the Elderly During COVID-19 and Their Root Causes in Remote Rural China: A Qualitative Study (preprint)

ABSTRACT

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the criticism of the elderly not wearing masks on Chinese social media has continued to this day, but the research on how to understand the elderly group's use of masks and the factors that affect the response to the epidemic is indeed lacking. This study aimed to address this topic, evaluate the factors that affect the mask-wearing behavior of the elderly in rural areas in the context of the epidemic, and dig out the root causes of these influencing factors from a social structural perspective. Through participant observation and semi-structured interviews with 15 elderly people in a remote village in central China, it was found that factors such as access to epidemic information, perceptions of masks, physical, illnesses and labor habits, and intergenerational social interactions are the main factors affecting the elderly. The key to judging the risk of the epidemic and whether to wear a mask is a significant disconnect from the symbolic meaning of politicizing, moralizing and legalizing masks in China's epidemic prevention and control. The root cause lies in the asymmetry of information channels between the elderly farmers and urban residents who are at the edge of the epidemic prevention and control system, the lack of shared code about the epidemic between the younger generation and the elderly in rural areas, and the dominant prevention and control policies and public health concepts ignore the underlying logic of the rural elderly. Together, they lead to the persistence of dynamic conflicts between the elderly and prevention measures. The analysis of such factors and structural contradictions reminds policymakers and mainstream society to be more tolerant of the rural elderly and take differentiated measures to care for and protect their health.