Vaccine hesitancy: clarifying a theoretical framework for an ambiguous notion (original) (raw)
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UNDERSTANDING VACCINE HESITANCY AS EXTENDED ATTITUDES
European Review of Applied Sociology, 2020
Vaccine hesitancy is not a singular view but encompasses a set of positions located between complete acceptance of vaccination and complete rejection of vaccination. In this paper, I argue that vaccine-hesitant attitudes emerge at the intersection of individual and structural processes, and thus can be better conceptualized as "extended attitudes". Drawing on the theoretical understanding of risk and science scepticism in post-modern societies, I consider hesitant attitudes towards vaccination as addressing risks that are induced in our everyday lives by science developments. I conducted K-Means Cluster Analysis on Eurobarometer data from 2019 regarding Europeans' attitudes towards vaccination. Four clusters of vaccine-hesitant attitudes were identified. "Price hesitation" and "Effort hesitation" result from restricted access to vaccination because of structural constraints, such as low economic capital and health care system' deficits. "Unexercised pro-vaccination" is an attitude manifested by people who grant authority to science to manage health-related risks, even though they did not vaccinate in the last five years. "Consistent anti-vaccination" pertains to highly reflexive individuals who dismiss experts' authority because of scientifically derived risks. My analysis enhances the theoretical understanding and the empirical assessment of vaccine-hesitant attitudes in the European Union and can inform public health policies in this area.
Vaccine Hesitancy, Acceptance, and Anti-Vaccination: Trends and Future Prospects for Public Health
Annual Review of Public Health
An often-stated public health comment is that “vaccination is a victim of its own success.” While the scientific and medical consensus on the benefits of vaccination is clear and unambiguous, an increasing number of people are perceiving vaccines as unsafe and unnecessary. The World Health Organization identified “the reluctance or refusal to vaccinate despite availability of vaccines” as one of the 10 threats to global health in 2019. The negative influence of anti-vaccination movements is often named as a cause of increasing vaccine resistance in the public. In this review, we give an overview of the current literature on the topic, beginning by agreeing on terminology and concepts before looking at potential causes, consequences, and impacts of resistance to vaccination.
Vaccine hesitancy: a structured review from a behavioral perspective (2015-2022
Psychology, Health & Medicine, 2024
Vaccine hesitancy, a complex behavioral phenomenon, poses a significant global health threat and has gained renewed attention amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper scrutinized peer-reviewed literature on vaccine hesitancy published from 2015 to 2022, with a specific focus on behavioral perspectives, utilizing a Theories-Constructs-Variables-Contexts-Methods (TCVCM) framework. The study highlighted prominent theoretical approaches, abstract concepts, research variables, global contexts and academic techniques employed across a selected sample of 138 studies. The result is a consolidated overview of research and schematization of the factors influencing vaccine hesitancy and vaccination behaviors. These include individual-level, contextual, vaccine-specific, organizational, and public-policy-related dynamics. The findings corroborated the complexity of vaccine hesitancy and emphasized the difficulties of pursuing vaccine advocacy. The analysis also identified several directions for future research, and the need to conduct more contextual studies in low-and middle-income nations to bring out the cross-cultural nuances of vaccine hesitancy.
Vaccine Hesitancy: A Threat to Vaccine Preventable Disease Programs
Khyber Medical University Journal, 2019
Childhood vaccination program provides one of the most cost-effective public health interventions. Vaccination prevents about 2-3 million deaths a year.1 Disease elimination and eradication programs are one of the most effective way to interrupt disease transmission, which results in reducing morbidity and mortality. After successful eradication of small pox in 19772, the world is close to achieve the goal of polio eradication. Polio eradication program has evolved since its beginning around three decades ago. However, the program has seen several challenges during this time around the globe. Hesitation to vaccinate remains one of the most important factors to determine the course of eradication program. Vaccine hesitancy is “the reluctance or refusal to vaccinate despite the availability of vaccines”.1 Any factor affecting the public trust in vaccine safety, purity or efficacy can result in variable level of vaccine hesitancy.3-5 Vaccine hesitancy, if not addressed timely and effec...
Vaccine hesitancy: understanding better to address better
Israel journal of health policy research, 2016
Vaccine hesitancy is an emerging term in the socio-medical literature which describes an approach to vaccine decision making. It recognizes that there is a continuum between full acceptance and outright refusal of some or all vaccines and challenges the previous understanding of individuals or groups, as being either anti-vaccine or pro-vaccine. The behaviours responsible for vaccine hesitancy can be related to confidence, convenience and complacency. The causes of vaccine hesitancy can be described by the epidemiological triad i.e. the complex interaction of environmental- (i.e. external), agent- (i.e. vaccine) and host (or parent)- specific factors. Vaccine hesitancy is a complex and dynamic issue; future vaccination programs need to reflect and address these context-specific factors in both their design and evaluation. Many experts are of the view that it is best to counter vaccine hesitancy at the population level. They believe that it can be done by introducing more transparenc...
Vaccines
Vaccine hesitancy has gained renewed attention as an important public health concern worldwide. Against this backdrop, over the last decade, we have conducted various qualitative, social science studies with the broad shared aim of better understanding this complex phenomenon. This has included various Cochrane systematic reviews of qualitative research globally, systematic reviews of qualitative research in Africa, and primary research studies in South Africa. These studies have also explored vaccine hesitancy for various vaccines, including routine childhood vaccination, HPV vaccination and other routine vaccinations for adolescents, and, most recently, COVID-19 vaccination. In this reflective and critical commentary piece we reflect on seven key overarching insights we feel we have gained about this complex phenomenon from the varying studies we have conducted over the past decade. These insights comprise the following: (1) the relationship between vaccine knowledge and hesitancy...
Addressing vaccine hesitancy: the LEARN approach
International Journal Of Community Medicine And Public Health, 2022
Immunization programs today stand at crossroads. Even as COVID vaccine campaigns continue, inequity, concerns and confusion around them seems ever expanding. While vaccine hesitancy in some form or the other has existed since the inception of vaccination, the complex and dynamic world that we live in now has resulted in hesitancy to vaccines become an outcome of myriad interactions that we encounter in our day to day lives. Factors extraneous to health systems are major determinants and it is essentially the culmination of economics, politics, science, and technology impacting human behaviors and emotions which result in a parent, family or a community arrive at the decision of whether to or not to vaccinate. Vaccine hesitancy is on the rise, it is becoming more organized and now is not just a problem of high- income countries. It is imperative that as public health advocates, academicians, policy makers, managers and implementers we recognize it and adopt a non-judgmental and non-p...
VACCINE HESITANCY: A 21 ST CENTURY CHALLENGE OF GLOBAL HEALTH IMPORTANCE
International Journal of Advanced Academic Research, 2022
Vaccine hesitancy is the complete rejection or a delay in accepting vaccines and vaccine services when such services are available and fully accessible. Vaccine hesitancy though relatively new in research literatures is classified as one of the major threats to global health in the 21 st century. Vaccine hesitancy has historically been in existence for centuries, but the current wave of hesitancy against the COVID-19 global pandemic vaccines has now brought it to the center stage. Vaccine hesitancy is predicated by some complex interrelated factors that border around convenience, complacency, and confidence. The attendant complex interrelating factors influencing vaccine hesitancy spans the continuum of space, time, and place. However, in a bid to mitigating these challenges, strategic and tailored advocacies, evidence-based implementation, tailored public health education, and a de-politicization of science is required. Thus, the continuous monitoring and evaluation of the impacts and mitigating efforts at combating vaccine hesitancy should be encouraged. Vaccines save lives! This fact should therefore remain the cornerstone of all vaccine advocacy efforts. This review seeks to evaluate issues surrounding vaccine hesitancy, especially as it relates to the COVID-19 vaccines; and suggested ways to navigating this current global health challenge.
Social Psychological Bulletin
This paper investigates the susceptibility to anti-vaccine rhetoric in the vaccine-hesitant population. Based on the literature on attitudes and attitude change it was assumed that susceptibility to anti-vaccine arguments may be related to personal experience with vaccination and to the strength of vaccine hesitant attitudes. The first aim of the study was to investigate the relation between personal experience with post-vaccination side effects and acceptance of select categories of anti-vaccine arguments. The second aim was to compare whether vaccination deniers and the vaccine-ambiguous group differ in their susceptibility to these arguments. The online survey was run in Poland on a final sample of 492 vaccine hesitant respondents. Results indicate that individuals who declared a negative experience with vaccination were persuaded by all types of anti-vaccine arguments. Moreover, pre-existing anti-vaccine skepticism may cause individuals to interpret negative symptoms as conseque...