Publication Type

Journal Article

Version

acceptedVersion

Publication Date

10-2026

Abstract

This study examines how individuals’ strategic sophistication shapes social distancing during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, when distancing was a costly protective decision under two sources of risk: the private risk of infection and strategic uncertainty about whether others would comply. We develop a weakest-link public goods game with private costs of social distancing, in which agents differ in their level-k depth of reasoning about others. The model predicts that the probability of distancing rises with the level-k type when baseline compliance is low. We test this prediction using large-scale, nationally representative survey data that include incentivized experiments to measure participants’ level-k types. We find that a one-level increase in level-k lowers the probability of leaving home daily by 1.6 percentage points in Singapore and is associated with a 3.4 percentage-point lower probability of maintaining or increasing outdoor activity in South Korea.

Keywords

Strategic uncertainty, Strategic sophistication, Level-k theory, Social distancing, COVID-19

Discipline

Behavioral Economics | Health Economics | Public Health

Publication

Journal of Risk and Uncertainity

First Page

1

Last Page

46

ISSN

0895-5646

Identifier

10.1007/s11166-026-09512-x

Copyright Owner and License

Authors-CC-BY

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Additional URL

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11166-026-09512-x

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