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Increasing confidence for pediatric COVID-19 and influenza vaccines using messages affirming parental autonomy: A
Lynne M Cotter1, Molecula Hopkins-Sheets2, Sijia Yang1
1School of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Wisconsin, Madison, USA.
Objectives:
To test the effects of autonomy-affirming pediatric vaccine messages for U.S. parents on overall vaccine confidence and intention to vaccinate against COVID-19 and flu while examining potential moderation effects of political ideology.
Methods:
We conducted an online randomized messaging experiment with 1718 parents, balanced across political ideology (31 % conservative, 37 % moderate, 31 % liberal). We compared four types of vaccine messages: 2 (autonomy-confirming vs authoritarian tone) x 2 (COVID-19 or flu). Parents viewed three messages within a single condition and rated their overall vaccine confidence and intentions to vaccinate their children.
Results:
Adjusted for covariates, we found significant interactions between autonomy-confirming language and ideology. Conservative parents who saw COVID-19 messages increased vaccine confidence in response to autonomy-confirming messages, compared to both moderate and liberal parents. For flu messages, we found that autonomy-confirming messages increased confidence and intention to vaccinate for conservative parents only.
Discussion:
Messages promoting pediatric COVID-19 and flu vaccination were generally more effective at increasing overall confidence toward vaccines for conservative parents when using autonomy-confirming language.
Conclusions:
Pediatric vaccinations are politicalized in the United States, and messaging strategies targeting parents must consider this. Public health agencies serving conservative parents can use autonomy-confirming messaging to positively influence parents' confidence in giving their children vaccines.
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