Behavioral responses of mandatory masking within social interactions

Social distance is known to impact interpersonal behaviors. We examine the potential consequences of mandated masking, which increases social distance, on social behavior. A controlled laboratory experiment was conducted to systematically impose a mask mandate in the treatment group, and to measure how this mandate affected other-regarding behavior within various social interactions. We find that behavior in the mandatory masking condition is less other-regarding compared to the control group with zero mask wearing. Particularly, we document less altruism, more sabotaging, and less cooperation. Our result suggests that mandatory masking has the potential to have broad behavioral consequences in the form of people generally becoming more selfish. Our results are found to be more pronounced among females than males.