AFTER a year of all things Covid, we have come to realize how much the pandemic has not only changed our lives, but has also made an impact on our attitudes and our behavior. Our efforts to cope with the challenges that come with it, seem to have unearthed emerging personalities we never thought we had. Each one, it seems, has his own pandemic response.
What is your pandemic personality? And why is it important to understand it? In an Inc.com article, Jessica Stillman states that âResearch Says There Are 16 Covid-19 Personality Types and Leaders Have to Plan for Them All.â She cites researcher Mimi Lam, who studies what happens when complex human and ecological systems collide. And the findings are very interesting.
In a recent paper in Humanities and Social Sciences Communication, Lam breaks down peopleâs response to the pandemic and explains how understanding the â16 Covid personality typesâ can help leaders design better pandemic plans. Here is her list of personalities:
1. Deniers: who downplay the viral threat, promoting business as usual
2. Spreaders: who want it to spread, herd immunity to develop, and normality to return
3. Harmers: who try to harm others by, for example, spitting or coughing at them
4. Realists: who recognize the reality of the potential harm and adjust their behaviors
5. Worriers: who stay informed and safe to manage their uncertainty and fear
6. Contemplators: who isolate and reflect on life and the world
7. Hoarders: who panic-buy and hoard products to quell their insecurity
8. Invincibles: often young, who believe themselves to be immune
9. Rebels: who defiantly ignore social rules restricting their individual freedoms
10. Blamers: who vent their fears and frustrations onto others
11. Exploiters: who exploit the situation for power, profit, or brutality
12. Innovators: who design or repurpose resources to fight the pandemic
13. Supporters: who show their solidarity in support of others
14. Altruists: who help the vulnerable, elderly, and isolated
15. Warriors: who, like the frontline health-care workers, combat its grim reality
16. Veterans: who experienced SARS or MERS and willingly comply with restrictions
âYouâll recognize these types from your Facebook feed and the nightly news,â says Stillman. Many of us are actually a composite of two or more personalities. For example, a Veteran can also be an Innovator.
But she says that âthe value of Lamâs work isnât in creating a characterization system to label your looniest colleagues.â
Instead, âitâs to remind everyone charged with leading through this difficult time that humans act in diverse and sometimes difficult ways when faced with uncertain, invisible threats.â And awareness about the different personality types is especially helpful for leaders.
That is because, âunderstanding the diverse ways people respond to a pandemic is a challenge to leaders who must manage diverse, mutually exclusive, and sometimes downright toxic responses to the pandemic within their teams. But it helps them make better plans.â
PR Matters is a roundtable column by members of the local chapter of the United Kingdom-based International Public Relations Association (Ipra), the worldâs premier association for senior professionals around the world. Millie Dizon, the senior vice president for Marketing and Communications of SM, is the former local chairman.
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