UCR psychology professor studies compliance with social distancing guidelines

RIVERSIDE (CNS) - A newly released study co-authored by a UC Riverside professor found that people with higher working memory capacity had an increased awareness of the benefits over costs of social distancing and showed more compliance with recommended guidelines during the early stage of the COVID-19 outbreak. According to Weiwei Zhang, an associate professor of psychology at UCR, the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences offers potential strategies to mitigate social distancing noncompliance in a public health crisis. "The higher the working memory capacity, the more likely that social distancing behaviors will follow,'' said Zhang, the paper's senior author. "Interestingly, this relationship holds even after we statistically control for relevant psych