The Correlation between Hofstede's Cultural Dimensions and COVID-19 Data in the Early Stage of the COVID-19 Pandemic Period

COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) has become the deadliest virus to affect the international community in recent history, with more than 760 million people infected and more than 6.87 million deaths as of March 2023; therefore, based on Hofstede's national cultural theory, this study collected Hofstede's six national cultural dimensions on a global scale, namely, power distance (PDI), individualism/collectivism (IDV), masculinity/femininity (MAS), uncertainty avoidance (UAI), long-term/short-term orientation (LTO), and indulgence/restraint (IVR) scores, and COVID-19 data from the World Health Organization (WHO) from 22 February 2020 to 30 February 2021. Then, based on eight items of global COVID-19 data, this study analyzed the correlation between Hofstede's six dimensions and the COVID-19 data from six regions (Africa (AFRO), Europe (EURO), the Americas (AMRO), the Western Pacific (WPRO), South East Asia (SEARO), and the Eastern Mediterranean (EMRO)) divided by the WHO. This study found the following: (1) Hofstede's six cultural dimensions indeed have a significant correlation with the COVID-19 data of different WHO regions in different ways. (2) Except for IDV and UAI, PDI is a highly critical factor and has a significant correlation with the COVID-19 data from AFRO and EMRO. MAS also is an important factor and has a significant correlation with COVID-19 data from WPRO and SEARO. Meanwhile, LTO has a significant correlation with some COVID-19 data from the AMRO region, and IVR has a significant correlation with some COVID-19 data from the EURO region. Finally, the new insights from this study are worthy of further study by scholars, and they will be of great help to global governments and medical institutions in formulating policies to suppress infectious diseases in the future.