April 4-6, 2024 • Hyatt Regency • Lexington, KY
Innovations in Health Communication
Innovations in Health Communication
Abstract: Theory-Based Approaches to Understanding and Predicting COVID-19 Vaccination Attitudes and Behaviors
Covid-19 continues to be a critical public health threat; the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has advised that the winter season of 2023-2024 brings the additional threat of a tripledemic of Covid-19, seasonal influenza, and Respiratory Syncytial Virus (CDC, 2023). Recent research has suggested that uptake of Covid-19 seasonal booster vaccinations is at less than 20% of eligible US residents (Jacobs et al., 2023). This research investigates the efficacy of two complementary theoretical orientations, Vested Interest Theory (VIT; Author) and Psychological Reactance Theory (PRT; Brehm, 1966; Dillard & Shen, 2005) as explanatory mechanisms for understanding and mitigating the continued resistance to the Covid-19 vaccine and seasonal boosters. Vested Interest Theory mediates the attitude-behavior relationship through a constellation of five distinct and observable beliefs - salience, certainty, immediacy, self-efficacy and response-efficacy. The theory specifies that when individuals report all five variables as high, their attitudes will predict behaviors with a high degree of reliability. Psychological Reactance Theory predicts that mandates, regulations, and commands may limit or remove individuals’ freedom to determine their own behaviors. Perceived restrictions of freedom manifest affectively as reported anger and threat. To ameliorate these negative emotions, threatened individuals may respond by resisting, counterarguing, and/or derogation of the mandate and its source.
In the present, each of VIT’s and PRT’s variables (described above) were measured in a nationally representative sample (N = 1,207), couched in the context of this season’s tripledemic. We also observed a number of attitudinal and behavioral variables associated with Covid-19, its vaccine and boosters, as well as perceived risk, general vaccine perceptions, and media consumption habits. Results indicate that both VIT and PRT’s variables predict consequential amounts of variance (R2ajd= .10 - .60) in crucial outcomes associated with mitigation of Covid-19 and vaccination uptake. Notably, VIT predicts variance in perceived Covid-19 health risk, Covid-19 vaccination intention, social media health information seeking, and vaccine hesitancy. Likewise, PRT variables show negative significant relationships with vaccine acceptance, vaccination behaviors, perceived risk and perceived COVID-19 vaccine efficacy. Our results suggest that these beliefs and attitudes play a critical role in health decision-making related to Covid-19 vaccination and general vaccination uptake. Scholars of health communication have long understood that theory-based health campaigns enjoy higher probabilities of successful outcomes compared to atheoretical efforts (Atkin & Freimuth, 2013); with this principle in mind, we argue that health campaigners and practitioners consider VIT and PRT in the development and execution of efforts in increase Covid19 vaccine uptake and related mitigation behaviors.
In the present, each of VIT’s and PRT’s variables (described above) were measured in a nationally representative sample (N = 1,207), couched in the context of this season’s tripledemic. We also observed a number of attitudinal and behavioral variables associated with Covid-19, its vaccine and boosters, as well as perceived risk, general vaccine perceptions, and media consumption habits. Results indicate that both VIT and PRT’s variables predict consequential amounts of variance (R2ajd= .10 - .60) in crucial outcomes associated with mitigation of Covid-19 and vaccination uptake. Notably, VIT predicts variance in perceived Covid-19 health risk, Covid-19 vaccination intention, social media health information seeking, and vaccine hesitancy. Likewise, PRT variables show negative significant relationships with vaccine acceptance, vaccination behaviors, perceived risk and perceived COVID-19 vaccine efficacy. Our results suggest that these beliefs and attitudes play a critical role in health decision-making related to Covid-19 vaccination and general vaccination uptake. Scholars of health communication have long understood that theory-based health campaigns enjoy higher probabilities of successful outcomes compared to atheoretical efforts (Atkin & Freimuth, 2013); with this principle in mind, we argue that health campaigners and practitioners consider VIT and PRT in the development and execution of efforts in increase Covid19 vaccine uptake and related mitigation behaviors.