COVID-19 vaccine refusal is driven by deliberate ignorance and cognitive distortions.

ABSTRACT: Vaccine hesitancy was a major challenge during the COVID-19 pandemic. A common but sometimes ineffective intervention to reduce vaccine hesitancy involves providing information on vaccine effectiveness, side effects, and related probabilities. Could biased processing of this information contribute to vaccine refusal? We examined the information inspection of 1200 U.S. participants with anti-vaccination, neutral, or pro-vaccination attitudes before they stated their willingness to accept eight different COVID-19 vaccines. All participants-particularly those who were anti-vaccination-frequently ignored some of the information. This deliberate ignorance, especially toward probabilities of extreme side effects, was a stronger predictor of vaccine refusal than typically investigated demographic

SUBMITTER: Fulawka K 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11399437 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature