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Review
. 2022 Mar:101:57-58.
doi: 10.1016/j.bbi.2021.12.018. Epub 2021 Dec 27.

Sorry, I am sneezing and coughing but I do not have COVID-19

Jaouad Bouayed  1
Affiliations
Review

Sorry, I am sneezing and coughing but I do not have COVID-19

Jaouad Bouayed. Brain Behav Immun. 2022 Mar.
No abstract available

Keywords: Behavioral immune system; COVID-19; Coughing; Sneezing; Social rejection; Stigmatization.

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Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Public sneezing or coughing during COVID-19 pandemic could become a source of embarrassment or stigmatization for uninfected individuals, as they could be perceived by members of the community as sensory signals indicative of potential infection threat by the causative virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2). The behavioral immune system (BIS) is a proactive system that detects a broad range of sensory cues indicating a real but also a potential threat of infection, and thus it could make errors of detection, judging e.g. a sneezing or coughing of uninfected person to be infectious. Depending on its sensibility that is variable among individuals and also the level of the threat, BIS triggers adaptive prophylactic behavior to avoid the source of infection in the goal to conserve the physiological immune system that is reactive, metabolically costly and risks to cause collateral damages. When the level of threat is perceived as imminent, BIS may also proactively activate the physiological immune system. Excessive BIS activation may lead to adverse behavioral outcomes including stigma-related behaviors such as social rejection and discrimination.
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