{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,3]],"date-time":"2026-06-03T02:02:24Z","timestamp":1780452144384,"version":"3.54.1"},"reference-count":49,"publisher":"SAGE Publications","issue":"1","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2021,1,1]],"date-time":"2021-01-01T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1609459200000},"content-version":"unspecified","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nc-nd\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["journals.sagepub.com"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Big Data &amp; Society"],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2021,1]]},"abstract":"<jats:p>Governments and citizens of nearly every nation have been compelled to respond to COVID-19. Many measures have been adopted, including contact tracing and risk assessment algorithms, whereby citizen whereabouts are monitored to trace contact with other infectious individuals in order to generate a risk status via algorithmic evaluation. Based on 38 in-depth interviews, we investigate how people make sense of Health Code ( jiankangma), the Chinese contact tracing and risk assessment algorithmic sociotechnical assemblage. We probe how people accept or resist Health Code by examining their ongoing, dynamic, and relational interactions with it. Participants display a rich variety of attitudes toward privacy and surveillance, ranging from fatalism to the possibility of privacy to trade-offs for surveillance in exchange for public health, which is mediated by the perceived effectiveness of Health Code and changing views on the intentions of institutions who deploy it. We show how perceived competency varies not just on how well the technology works, but on the social and cultural enforcement of various non-technical aspects like quarantine, citizen data inputs, and cell reception. Furthermore, we illustrate how perceptions of Health Code are nested in people\u2019s broader interpretations of disease control at the national and global level, and unexpectedly strengthen the Chinese authority\u2019s legitimacy. None of the Chinese public, Health Code, or people\u2019s perceptions toward Health Code are predetermined, fixed, or categorically consistent, but are co-constitutive and dynamic over time. We conclude with a theorization of a relational perception and methodological reflections to study algorithmic sociotechnical assemblages beyond COVID-19.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1177\/2053951721995218","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2021,2,20]],"date-time":"2021-02-20T23:51:55Z","timestamp":1613865115000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1177\/sage-journals-update-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":57,"title":["Making sense of algorithms: Relational perception of contact tracing and risk assessment during COVID-19"],"prefix":"10.1177","volume":"8","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-5842-7988","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Chuncheng","family":"Liu","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Sociology, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, USA"},{"name":"Both authors contributed equally to this work."}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-4578-7022","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Ross","family":"Graham","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Sociology, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, USA"},{"name":"Both authors contributed equally to this work."}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"179","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2021,2,17]]},"reference":[{"key":"bibr1-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.3386\/w27972"},{"key":"bibr2-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Amelang K, Bauer S (2019) Following the algorithm: How epidemiological risk-scores do accountability.\n                      Social Studies of Science\n                      49(4): 476\u2013502.","DOI":"10.1177\/0306312719862049"},{"key":"bibr3-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1111\/1467-9566.ep10933329"},{"key":"bibr4-2053951721995218","unstructured":"Au L, Fu Z, Liu C (2020) It is (not) like the flu: Expertise and temporality in United States, China, and Hong Kong. In:\n                      Covid-19 conference\n                      , 10-11 July, 2020."},{"key":"bibr5-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1016\/S2589-7500(20)30133-3"},{"key":"bibr6-2053951721995218","volume-title":"Practical Reason: On the Theory of Action (Trans. R Johnson)","author":"Bourdieu P","year":"1998","edition":"1"},{"key":"bibr7-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Brayne S, Christin A (2020) Technologies of crime prediction: The reception of algorithms in policing and criminal courts.\n                      Social Problems\n                      . Epub ahead of print 5 March 2020. doi: 10.1093\/socpro\/spaa004","DOI":"10.1093\/socpro\/spaa004"},{"key":"bibr8-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1080\/1369118X.2016.1154086"},{"key":"bibr9-2053951721995218","unstructured":"Center for Disease Control (2020) Contact tracing. 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(2020) The coronavirus (safeguards) bill 2020: Proposed protections for digital interventions and in relation to immunity certificates. Preprint, 13 April.\n                      LawArXiv\n                      . DOI: 10.31228\/osf.io\/yc6xu","DOI":"10.31228\/osf.io\/yc6xu"},{"key":"bibr16-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1086\/231209"},{"key":"bibr17-2053951721995218","volume-title":"Automating Inequality: How High-Tech Tools Profile, Police, and Punish the Poor","author":"Eubanks V","year":"2018"},{"key":"bibr18-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/0306422020935796"},{"key":"bibr19-2053951721995218","volume-title":"The History of Sexuality, Vol. 1: An Introduction","author":"Foucault M","year":"1990"},{"key":"bibr20-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.5070\/LP61150258"},{"issue":"1","key":"bibr21-2053951721995218","first-page":"9","volume":"15","author":"Fourcade M","year":"2017","journal-title":"Socio-Economic Review"},{"key":"bibr22-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.24908\/ss.v18i1.13985"},{"key":"bibr23-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/0163443719831184"},{"key":"bibr24-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.24908\/ss.v15i3\/4.6610"},{"key":"bibr25-2053951721995218","unstructured":"Ilyushina M (2020) Moscow rolls out digital tracking to enforce lockdown. Critics dub it a \u2018cyber Gulag\u2019. Available at: www.cnn.com\/2020\/04\/14\/world\/moscow-cyber-tracking-qr-code-intl\/index.html (accessed 24 August 2020)."},{"key":"bibr26-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/0162243915587360"},{"key":"bibr27-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1080\/1369118X.2016.1154087"},{"key":"bibr28-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1080\/13562576.2020.1770587"},{"key":"bibr29-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.4159\/9780674039681"},{"key":"bibr30-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/1461444819826402"},{"key":"bibr31-2053951721995218","unstructured":"Liang G, Chang H (2006) Surveillance and privacy in urban China. 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Available at: http:\/\/arxiv.org\/abs\/2004.06818 (accessed 10 August 2020)."},{"key":"bibr45-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/0735275112457914"},{"key":"bibr46-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1080\/13569317.2020.1750759"},{"key":"bibr47-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.3390\/su11061595"},{"key":"bibr48-2053951721995218","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1080\/1369118X.2018.1543442"},{"key":"bibr49-2053951721995218","volume-title":"The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power","author":"Zuboff S","year":"2019","edition":"1"}],"container-title":["Big Data &amp; Society"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/pdf\/10.1177\/2053951721995218","content-type":"application\/pdf","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"text-mining"},{"URL":"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/full-xml\/10.1177\/2053951721995218","content-type":"application\/xml","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"text-mining"},{"URL":"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/pdf\/10.1177\/2053951721995218","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2026,4,28]],"date-time":"2026-04-28T12:58:16Z","timestamp":1777381096000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/10.1177\/2053951721995218"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2021,1]]},"references-count":49,"journal-issue":{"issue":"1","published-print":{"date-parts":[[2021,1]]}},"alternative-id":["10.1177\/2053951721995218"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1177\/2053951721995218","relation":{"has-preprint":[{"id-type":"doi","id":"10.31235\/osf.io\/nkhef","asserted-by":"object"}]},"ISSN":["2053-9517","2053-9517"],"issn-type":[{"value":"2053-9517","type":"print"},{"value":"2053-9517","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2021,1]]},"article-number":"2053951721995218"}}