Media Data and Vaccine Hesitancy: Scoping Review

Area of Science:

• Digital epidemiology
• Media studies
• Public health research

Background:

• Media studies are crucial for understanding vaccine hesitancy by examining how media influences risk perception and vaccine uptake.
• Despite advancements in computational and language processing, a consolidated view of methodological approaches in vaccine hesitancy media research is lacking.
• Synthesizing these methods can establish a precedent for the growing field of digital epidemiology.

Purpose of the Study:

• To identify and illustrate media platforms and methods used in vaccine hesitancy research.
• To analyze how these platforms and methods contribute to understanding the media's influence on vaccine hesitancy and public health.
• To provide a comprehensive overview for structuring future research in this domain.

Main Methods:

• Systematic review following PRISMA-ScR guidelines.
• Searched PubMed and Scopus for studies published after 2010 using media data and vaccine sentiment outcomes.
• Extracted data on media platforms, analysis methods, theoretical models, and outcomes.

Main Results:

• 125 studies were included: 71 (56.8%) used traditional methods (content analysis, sentiment analysis) primarily with newspapers and print media; 54 (43.2%) used computational methods (sentiment analysis, topic modeling, network analysis) mainly with Twitter and Facebook.
• Traditional methods focused on content and sentiment analysis of newspapers and print media.
• Computational methods utilized sentiment analysis, topic modeling, and network analysis on platforms like Twitter and Facebook.
• Most studies exhibited weak theoretical grounding.
• Identified key themes: distrust in institutions, civil liberties, misinformation, conspiracy theories, vaccine safety, framing effects, and public reactions to specific events.

Conclusions:

• Consolidating diverse media analysis methods through theoretical grounding is essential for advancing vaccine hesitancy research.
• Future research should explore the links between institutional trust, misinformation, signaling, and vaccine uptake, as well as evaluate government communications.
• Media data analysis should complement, not replace, existing public health research practices.