A media intervention applying debunking versus non-debunking content to combat vaccine misinformation in elderly in the Netherlands: A digital randomised trial

Background: As several COVID-19 vaccines are rolled-out globally, it has become important to develop an effective strategy for vaccine acceptance, especially in high-risk groups, such as elderly. Vaccine misconception was declared by WHO as one of the top 10 health issues in 2019. Here we test the effectiveness of applying debunking to combat vaccine misinformation, and reduce vaccine hesitancy. Methods: Participants were recruited via a daily news show on Dutch Television, targeted to elderly viewers. The study was conducted in 980 elderly citizens during the October 2020 National Influenza V... Mehr ...

Verfasser: Hamza Yousuf
Sander van der Linden
Luke Bredius
G.A. (Ted) van Essen
Govert Sweep
Zohar Preminger
Eric van Gorp
Erik Scherder
Jagat Narula
Leonard Hofstra
Dokumenttyp: Artikel
Erscheinungsdatum: 2021
Reihe/Periodikum: EClinicalMedicine, Vol 35, Iss , Pp 100881- (2021)
Verlag/Hrsg.: Elsevier
Schlagwörter: Vaccines / Misinformation / Public health / Media psychology / Debunking / Media intervention / Medicine (General) / R5-920
Sprache: Englisch
Permalink: https://search.fid-benelux.de/Record/base-29168546
Datenquelle: BASE; Originalkatalog
Powered By: BASE
Link(s) : https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eclinm.2021.100881

Background: As several COVID-19 vaccines are rolled-out globally, it has become important to develop an effective strategy for vaccine acceptance, especially in high-risk groups, such as elderly. Vaccine misconception was declared by WHO as one of the top 10 health issues in 2019. Here we test the effectiveness of applying debunking to combat vaccine misinformation, and reduce vaccine hesitancy. Methods: Participants were recruited via a daily news show on Dutch Television, targeted to elderly viewers. The study was conducted in 980 elderly citizens during the October 2020 National Influenza Vaccination Campaign. Borrowing from the recent literature in behavioural science and psychology we conducted a two-arm randomized blinded parallel study, in which participants were allocated to exposure to a video containing social norms, vaccine information plus debunking of vaccination myths (intervention group, n = 505) or a video only containing vaccine information plus social norm (control group, n = 475). Participants who viewed either of the video's and completed both a pre- and post-intervention survey on vaccination trust and knowledge, were included in the analysis. The main outcomes of this study were improvement on vaccine knowledge and awareness. Findings: Participants were recruited from the 13th of October 2020 till the 16th of October 2020 and could immediately participate in the pre-intervention survey. Subsequently, eligible participants were randomly assigned to an interventional video and the follow-up survey, distributed through email on the 18th of October 2020, and available for participation till the 24th of October 2020. We found that exposure to the video with addition of debunking strategies on top of social norm modelling and information resulted in substantially stronger rejection of vaccination misconceptions, including the belief that: (1) vaccinations can cause Autism Spectrum Disorders; (2) vaccinations weaken the immune system; (3) influenza vaccination would hamper the COVID-19 vaccine ...