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Researching Fantasies

alec
Jan 11, 2021
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Researching Fantasies

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Before we get all excited from the title of this post, I’m not here to talk about our daydreams, or the things we do in our ‘personal time’.

Instead, we’re going to talk about the optimistic lies we tell ourselves - our fantasies about the way we wish the world to be, and what that means for research.

Not too long ago…

A while back I was working at a consultancy as a researcher on a project that involved helping people improve credit scores. There was an interest from the client in creating a tool that would help people grow their score from bad to good.

But as we started the research for the project, we learned that

  1. people have no clue what goes into a credit score (see below)

  2. they didn’t understand the implications of an improved credit score.

In essence, we had dreamed up a fantasy about what people wanted that simply didn’t reflect people’s actions and attitudes in reality.

COVID Fantasies

COVID-19 has become one of the most polarizing issues since… well probably whatever we were talking about immediately before the pandemic.

Some people (such as myself) are very concerned about the virus and have made major behaviour changes to avoid getting, and subsequently spreading, the virus. In Canada, where I live, we have had a relatively low caseload and low transmission rates. That is, until October.

In response, the province of Ontario has instituted local, and now provincial-wide lockdowns to curb the spread of the virus. Yet, cases have continued to rise. How can this be?

This tweet provides some answers 👇

Twitter avatar for @jyangstar
Jennifer Yang @jyangstar
For one: Mobility data suggests a lot of people circumvented lockdown by simply traveling to nearby regions. In two malls in Halton and Durham, there were *more* last-minute Christmas shoppers from locked-down areas than there were local shoppers
Image
8:48 PM ∙ Jan 10, 2021
376Likes152Retweets

That’s right, while Toronto and the surrounding areas were in lockdown, more people from lockdown areas shopped at Halton malls than local Halton residents. But surely, our leaders are setting a better example?

Let’s turn to Dr. Tom Stewart, head of Ontario’s largest hospital network and part of the provinces COVID19 Advisory Committee for more.

How it started 👇

How it’s going 👇

Twitter avatar for @CBCAlerts
CBC News Alerts @CBCAlerts
Dr. Tom Stewart, CEO of St. Joseph's Health System and Niagara Health spent weeks in the Dominican Republic amid COVID-19 pandemic.
cbc.caOntario hospital CEO vacationed in Dominican Republic amid COVID-19 pandemic | CBC NewsThe CEO of Ontario’s St. Joseph’s Health System in Hamilton and Niagara Health System vacationed in the Caribbean over the holidays despite government advisories to stay at home as the number of COVID-19 cases soared across the province.
12:26 AM ∙ Jan 6, 2021
739Likes513Retweets

Dozens of Canadian politicians at the provincial and federal level, from all parties, have had their winter-holiday international travel exposed leading to resignations, half-hearted apologies, and some truly extraordinary tweets.

Like this one from the Ontario NDP, who shared a video of a provincial minister calling into a meeting from the Caribbean! You can hear the ocean in the background!!!

Twitter avatar for @OntarioNDP
Ontario NDP @OntarioNDP
Here is Rod Phillips during a Zoom meeting on Dec 16, which he attended from St. Barts, with a fake Queens Park backdrop. And yes, it does sound like those are waves in the background. You can’t make this stuff up. #FireRodPhillips Agree? Add your name. ontariondp.ca/fire-rod-phill…
Image
9:54 PM ∙ Dec 30, 2020
931Likes373Retweets

Lockdowns, in name only

So what does all this mean? And how does this related to research?

As researchers, we often say that we “represent the user”. This is incorrect. We aren’t supposed to represent the user, we are supposed to represent reality.

This is often very difficult as reality rarely corresponds nicely with the beliefs and aspirations of the teams we work with. However, it is critical to outline what is true about our reality, and where our hopes and beliefs about the world do not coincide.

The reality of our COVID19 situation in Canada is that there will be no more lockdowns. Or at least, there will be no mass compliance with lockdown orders, be that among the populace or our political leaders.

That means that our choices as individuals, and our policy prescriptions, must change. They should be based on the reality that most people will not comply. Interventions should probably focus more on things individuals can do to protect themselves and their families, and identifying and interfering with potential super-spreader events.

This is a depressing truth, but it is our reality. And as researchers, reality and not idealistic fantasies is what we need to represent.

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