The Face Mask and the Embodiment of Stigma

The COVID-19 pandemic has spawned a rare opportunity to study some latent social structures using data science. The Chinese government and its people have been blamed for the outbreak of the virus. Face mask wearing can signal an embodied stigma and Chinese people living outside China have been subject to discrimination, assault, and other hate crimes, particularly at the early stages of the crisis. However, as we accumulate more evidence surrounding mask use, the stigma is shifting. As more scientific data become available and people leave even more information on social media during the lockdown, data science can help better understand the trajectories of the stigma. The insights generated have implications for anti-stigma interventions for future undesirable conditions and diseases.