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1.
HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies ; 79(4), 2023.
Article in English | Scopus | ID: covidwho-20240467

ABSTRACT

Churches have always been regarded as a safe haven during calamities. This changed during COVID-19 lockdown when churches were forced to shut down. The COVID-19 pandemic has posed a new normal to the world at large, calling for immediate action from authorities and introducing vaccination as an antidote. However, some religious practitioners as a vehicle of change through the institution of the church have been acting on the contrary because it discourages the uptake of vaccines, leading to vaccine hesitancy. COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy has been observed in the Christian community because Christians use Bible verses as a scapegoat for not getting a jab. There is a chasm that exists between faith and science, and it perpetuates the discourse of vaccine hesitancy. Contributions: This article applies a qualitative descriptive phenomenological approach and seeks to address the conspiracy theories and the use of Bible verses as discourse on vaccine uptake. © 2023. The Author. Licensee: AOSIS. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution License.

2.
Istanbul Universitesi Sosyoloji Dergisi-Istanbul University Journal of Sociology ; 42(2):411-436, 2022.
Article in English | Web of Science | ID: covidwho-2310297

ABSTRACT

The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in changes that have disabled routines in many respects regarding the daily form social life takes around the world. Numerous restrictions such as wearing masks, physical distancing, disinfectant use, and curfews have been put into effect to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 virus, and this has suspended the established norms of individual, societal, state, and interstate relations. Three different social reflexes and groups have emerged that can be categorized as provaccine, anti-vaccine, and hesitant with regard to vaccines' ability to end or minimize the effects of the pandemic. The aim of this study is to reveal the attitudes and perceptions toward COVID-19 vaccines regarding a sample group of 1,635 people in Van, one of the relatively least socioeconomically developed cities in Turkiye with a low elderly population and below-average rate of residents who've caught COVID-19 in Turkiye. This study focuses on determining the relationships that gender, age, marital status, education level, household size, income level, occupation, political party preference, chronic illness, and whether contracted COVID or not (if so, the severity) have with their status of being pro-vaccine, anti-vaccine, or vaccine-hesitant. The findings reveal a significant relationship to exist between vaccine attitude and the selected variables apart from gender and chronic illness, and status of having contracted COVID-19 or not.

3.
Physician Assistant Clinics ; 2023.
Article in English | Scopus | ID: covidwho-2293030
4.
Vaccines (Basel) ; 11(4)2023 Apr 13.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2305787

ABSTRACT

The anti-vaccination movement was an ongoing issue in Malaysia, a Muslim-majority country, even before the COVID-19 pandemic. It is unclear whether the introduction of new COVID-19 vaccines would similarly provoke anti-vaccine sentiments. This study analyzed COVID-19 anti-vaccine sentiments in the Malaysian community. Anti-vaccine comments from Facebook page posts were extracted. The qualitative software QSR-NVivo 10 was used to manage, code and analyze the data. The fast-track COVID-19 vaccine evoked the fear of unknown long-term effects, safety, effectiveness and the duration of protection. The halal status of the COVID-19 vaccines is important. Although it is permissible to use vaccines that are not certified halal under the state of darurah (emergency), there was doubt that the current state has reached the stage of darurah that warrants the use of vaccines. COVID-19 vaccine microchip conspiracy theories were raised. COVID-19 is viewed as only severe for vulnerable populations, and hence vaccination is not needed for the healthy. There were opinions that coronavirus treatments would be more beneficial than vaccination. The anti-COVID-19 vaccine sentiments uncovered in this study provide important insights for the formulation of public health messages to instill confidence in new COVID-19 vaccines. Despite the pandemic being nearly over and many people worldwide having received COVID-19 vaccines, the findings provide important insight into potential issues regarding the introduction of new vaccines in the event of future pandemics.

5.
Inquiry ; 60: 469580231155723, 2023.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2286593

ABSTRACT

Vaccines are doubtlessly one of the most crucial life-saving medical interventions to date. However, perplexingly, they court more public controversy than their objectively excellent safety profile warrants. While doubts about the safety of vaccines, as well as opposition to vaccine policies, can be traced back at least to the mid-19th century, the modern anti-vaccine movement has come in 3 distinct waves, or generations, each precipitating around distinct key events. Here, we describe the first 2 generations and trace the origins of an emerging third generation anti-vaccine movement. Currently, this third generation is an integral part of the larger anti-COVID movement and in this more libertarian environment propagates the idea of individualism superseding the responsibility for community health. We highlight the need for a better science education of the young, as well as the general public to further enhance overall science literacy and suggests strategies to achieve these goals.


Subject(s)
Vaccination , Vaccines , Humans , Anti-Vaccination Movement , Communication , Public Health
6.
JMIR Form Res ; 7: e41799, 2023 03 06.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2263541

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Hesitancy to get vaccinated during the COVID-19 pandemic may decrease vaccination coverage and facilitate the occurrence of local or global outbreaks. OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to analyze the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in Catalonia on 3 aspects: the decision to get vaccinated against COVID-19, changes in opinion about vaccination in general, and the decision to get vaccinated against other diseases. METHODS: We performed an observational study with the population of Catalonia aged 18 years or over, obtaining information through a self-completed questionnaire in electronic format. Differences between groups were determined using the chi-square test, Mann-Whitney U test, or the Student t test. RESULTS: We analyzed the answers from 1188 respondents, of which 870 were women, 47.0% (558/1187) had sons or daughters under the age of 14 years, and 71.7% (852/1188) had studied at university. Regarding vaccination, 16.3% (193/1187) stated that they had refused a vaccine on some occasion, 76.3% (907/1188) totally agreed with vaccines, 1.9% (23/1188) were indifferent, and 3.5% (41/1188) and 1.2% (14/1188) slightly or totally disagreed with vaccination, respectively. As a result of the pandemic, 90.8% (1069/1177) stated that they would get vaccinated against COVID-19 when they are asked, while 9.2% (108/1177) stated the opposite. A greater intention to get vaccinated was observed among women; people older than 50 years; people without children under 15 years of age; people with beliefs, culture, or family in favor of vaccination; respondents who had not previously rejected other vaccines, were totally in favor of vaccines, or had not increased their doubts about vaccination; and respondents who had not changed their decision about vaccines as a result of the pandemic. Finally, 30.3% (359/1183) reported an increase in their doubts regarding vaccination, and 13.0% (154/1182) stated that they had changed their decision about routinely recommended vaccines as a result of the pandemic. CONCLUSIONS: The population studied was predominantly in favor of vaccination; however, the percentage of people specifically rejecting vaccination against COVID-19 was high. As a result of the pandemic, we detected an increase in doubts about vaccines. Although the final decision about vaccination did not primarily change, some of the respondents did change their opinion about routine vaccinations. This seed of doubt about vaccines may be worrisome as we aim to maintain high vaccination coverage.

7.
Psychol Health ; : 1-15, 2023 Feb 23.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2279470

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: This study investigated (i) factors predicting the seeking and sharing of vaccinerelated information, and (ii) the effect of an accuracy-sensitisation prime on sharing intentions. Design:This was a preregistered online survey with 213 participants. Participants were randomly assigned to an intervention group (who were exposed to an accuracy-sensitisation prime) or a control group. DESIGN: This was a preregistered online survey with 213 participants. Participants were randomly assigned to an intervention group (who were exposed to an accuracy-sensitisation prime) or a control group. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Measures included decision-making style, COVID-19 anxiety, and percentages of pro and anti-vaccine friends. We also measured preferences to seek pro or anti-vaccine-related information and sharing intentions with respect to this information. RESULTS: Compared with those seeking both pro and anti-vaccine information, participants seeking only pro-vaccine information had lower hypervigilance and buck-passing and higher COVID-19 anxiety. The likelihood of sharing anti-vaccine information was positively predicted by the percentage of one's anti-vaccine friends, the size of one's social network, and conservative political orientation. Conversely, the likelihood of sharing pro-vaccine information was positively predicted by the percentage of one's pro-vaccine friends, and liberal political orientation. Participants sensitised to accuracy were significantly more likely to share provaccine information; however, accuracy-sensitisation had no effect on anti-vaccine information sharing. CONCLUSIONS: Individuals who seek anti-vaccine information have a tendency towards disorganised and impulsive decision-making. Accuracy-sensitisation may prime people to internalise a norm promoting truth-sharing.

8.
Front Sociol ; 8: 1141416, 2023.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2273307

ABSTRACT

Coordinated inauthentic behavior (CIB) is a manipulative communication tactic that uses a mix of authentic, fake, and duplicated social media accounts to operate as an adversarial network (AN) across multiple social media platforms. The article aims to clarify how CIB's emerging communication tactic "secretly" exploits technology to massively harass, harm, or mislead the online debate around crucial issues for society, like the COVID-19 vaccination. CIB's manipulative operations could be one of the greatest threats to freedom of expression and democracy in our society. CIB campaigns mislead others by acting with pre-arranged exceptional similarity and "secret" operations. Previous theoretical frameworks failed to evaluate the role of CIB on vaccination attitudes and behavior. In light of recent international and interdisciplinary CIB research, this study critically analyzes the case of a COVID-19 anti-vaccine adversarial network removed from Meta at the end of 2021 for brigading. A violent and harmful attempt to tactically manipulate the COVID-19 vaccine debate in Italy, France, and Germany. The following focal issues are discussed: (1) CIB manipulative operations, (2) their extensions, and (3) challenges in CIB's identification. The article shows that CIB acts in three domains: (i) structuring inauthentic online communities, (ii) exploiting social media technology, and (iii) deceiving algorithms to extend communication outreach to unaware social media users, a matter of concern for the general audience of CIB-illiterates. Upcoming threats, open issues, and future research directions are discussed.

9.
Apsipa Transactions on Signal and Information Processing ; 11(2), 2022.
Article in English | Web of Science | ID: covidwho-2245154

ABSTRACT

Currently, the significance of social media in disseminating noteworthy information on topics such as health, politics, and the economy is indisputable. During the COVID-19 pandemic, anti-vaxxers have used social media to distribute fake news and anxiety-provoking information about the vaccine. Such social media practice may harm the public. Here, we characterise the psycho-linguistic features of anti-vaxxers on the online social network Twitter. For this, we collected COVID-19 related tweets from February 2020 to June 2021 to analyse vaccination stance, linguistic features, and social network characteristics. Our results demonstrated that, compared to pro-vaxxers, anti-vaxxers tend to have more negative emotions, narrative thinking, and immoral tendencies. Furthermore, we found a tighter network structure in anti-vaxxers even after mass vaccination. This study can advance our understanding of the online anti-vaccination movement, and become critical for social media management and policy action during and after the pandemic.

10.
International Journal of Public Health Science ; 12(1):203-214, 2023.
Article in English | Scopus | ID: covidwho-2203631

ABSTRACT

This study aimed to examine the influence of expectations on vaccines, trust in government, perceived threats, and information overload to cognitive dissonance and its implications for vaccine use, behavioral negotiation, and information avoidance. After we formulated eight hypotheses, all of them was tested using the partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) method. This study involved 173 community members to fill out a questionnaire with 31 questions. The results showed that expectations of vaccines and information overload affected cognitive dissonance. In contrast, the perceived threat due to the COVID-19 pandemic and trust in the government did not affect cognitive dissonance. We also found that cognitive dissonance negatively and significantly affected vaccine use and positively and significantly affected behavior to continue negotiating and avoiding information related to COVID-19 vaccination. This study is among the first to examine members of the anti-vaccine community quantitatively and practically attempts to intervene in the anti-vaccine community so that they are cognitively dissonant are to increase expectations of vaccination and confuse them by presenting the information overload they receive. © 2023, Intelektual Pustaka Media Utama. All rights reserved.

11.
JMIR Infodemiology ; 2(1): e37077, 2022.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2198049

ABSTRACT

Background: Messages on one's stance toward vaccination on microblogging sites may affect the reader's decision on whether to receive a vaccine. Understanding the dissemination of provaccine and antivaccine messages relating to COVID-19 on social media is crucial; however, studies on this topic have remained limited. Objective: This study applies the elaboration likelihood model (ELM) to explore the characteristics of vaccine stance messages that may appeal to Twitter users. First, we examined the associations between the characteristics of vaccine stance tweets and the likelihood and number of retweets. Second, we identified the relative importance of the central and peripheral routes in decision-making on sharing a message. Methods: English-language tweets from the United States that contained provaccine and antivaccine hashtags (N=150,338) were analyzed between April 26 and August 26, 2021. Logistic and generalized negative binomial regressions were conducted to predict retweet outcomes. The content-related central-route predictors were measured using the numbers of hashtags and mentions, emotional valence, emotional intensity, and concreteness. The content-unrelated peripheral-route predictors were measured using the numbers of likes and followers and whether the source was a verified user. Results: Content-related characteristics played a prominent role in shaping decisions regarding whether to retweet antivaccine messages. Particularly, positive valence (incidence rate ratio [IRR]=1.32, P=.03) and concreteness (odds ratio [OR]=1.17, P=.01) were associated with higher numbers and likelihood of retweets of antivaccine messages, respectively; emotional intensity (subjectivity) was associated with fewer retweets of antivaccine messages (OR=0.78, P=.03; IRR=0.80, P=.04). However, these factors had either no or only small effects on the sharing of provaccine tweets. Retweets of provaccine messages were primarily determined by content-unrelated characteristics, such as the numbers of likes (OR=2.55, IRR=2.24, P<.001) and followers (OR=1.31, IRR=1.28, P<.001). Conclusions: The dissemination of antivaccine messages is associated with both content-related and content-unrelated characteristics. By contrast, the dissemination of provaccine messages is primarily driven by content-unrelated characteristics. These findings signify the importance of leveraging the peripheral route to promote the dissemination of provaccine messages. Because antivaccine tweets with positive emotions, objective content, and concrete words are more likely to be disseminated, policymakers should pay attention to antivaccine messages with such characteristics.

12.
Vaccines (Basel) ; 10(10)2022 Sep 22.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2155323

ABSTRACT

Vaccination, despite being recognized as one of the most effective primary public health measures, is viewed as unsafe and unnecessary by an increasing number of individuals. Anxiety about vaccines and vaccination programs leading to vaccine hesitancy results from a complex mix of social and political influences, cultural and religious beliefs, the availability of and ability to interpret health and scientific information, and personal and population experiences of health systems and government policies. Vaccine hesitancy is becoming a serious threat to vaccination programs, and was identified as one of the World Health Organization's top ten global health threats in 2019. The negative impact of anti-vaccination movements is frequently cited as one of the major reasons for rising vaccine hesitancy amongst the general public world-wide. This review discusses the various issues surrounding vaccine hesitancy and the anti-vaccine movement, starting with the definitions of vaccine hesitancy and the anti-vaccine movement in their early history and in the modern era, before discussing the key drivers of vaccine hesitancy, particularly across different regions of the world, with a focus on various countries with low-, middle-, or high-income economies with different socio-economic populations. The review concludes with the impact of vaccine hesitancy on herd immunity and social, psychological, and public health measures to counter vaccine hesitancy.

13.
P R Health Sci J ; 41(4): 185-191, 2022 12.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2156499

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: Accurate and inaccurate vaccination information is readily accessible. Unfortunately, the information found by parents may be wrong. Due to the limited studies on this issue in Puerto Rico, we aim to correlate Puerto Rican parents' sociodemographic characteristics to their vaccine hesitancy level. METHODS: We quantified vaccine hesitancy in Puerto Rican parents and legal guardians who were at least 18 years old using the Parent Attitudes about Childhood Vaccines survey, their attitudes towards a possible SARS-CoV-2 vaccine, and the correlation between vaccine hesitancy and socio-demographic factors. The subjects were recruited through social networks and by distributing the online survey among pediatricians in Puerto Rico. RESULTS: We identified a vaccine hesitancy prevalence of 38.3%, higher than has been found by other similar studies. The results also demonstrated a significant association between vaccine hesitancy, income, and the type of legal guardian. Participants with a household income less than $75,000 and a legal guardian were more likely to be vaccine-hesitant. Most participants surveyed (80.8%) would not immediately vaccinate their children against SARS-CoV-2, independent of vaccine-hesitancy status, citing general worries of vaccine safety and side effects. CONCLUSION: Our results demonstrate the need for better vaccine-education campaigns in Puerto Rico and the challenges that SARS- CoV-2 vaccine fears pose to the proper control of the COVID-19 pandemic. It should be noted that at the time of the survey described herein, a COVID-19 vaccine had yet been developed.


Subject(s)
COVID-19 Vaccines , COVID-19 , Child , Humans , Adolescent , SARS-CoV-2 , Pandemics , Puerto Rico , Vaccination Hesitancy , COVID-19/prevention & control , Vaccination , Parents , Demography
14.
Frontiers in Political Science ; 4, 2022.
Article in English | Scopus | ID: covidwho-1993812

ABSTRACT

People's responses to the threat posed by COVID-19 varied widely. In direct contradiction to the popular theory that Trump supporters prefer to submit to powerful people, Trump's most enthusiastic followers actually were the most vocal in resisting the urgings of authorities to get vaccinated and to wear masks. I explain this anomaly by showing that Trump's followers are driven less by a desire for authority and more by a desire to be secure from the threats human outsiders pose to society's historically dominant racial, language, religious, and cultural group. Far from being authoritarians, the followers of leaders such as Donald Trump stridently oppose all authority figures who divert attention from what they believe are the real threats: immigrants, powerful foreign enemies, diversity, terrorists, and criminals. From this perspective, it is unsurprising that those with a securitarian orientation would not take seriously authorities who are concerned with the threat posed by an mRNA virus. Copyright © 2022 Hibbing.

15.
45th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, SIGIR 2022 ; : 3154-3164, 2022.
Article in English | Scopus | ID: covidwho-1973879

ABSTRACT

Convincing people to get vaccinated against COVID-19 is a key societal challenge in the present times. As a first step towards this goal, many prior works have relied on social media analysis to understand the specific concerns that people have towards these vaccines, such as potential side-effects, ineffectiveness, political factors, and so on. Though there are datasets that broadly classify social media posts into Anti-vax and Pro-Vax labels, there is no dataset (to our knowledge) that labels social media posts according to the specific anti-vaccine concerns mentioned in the posts. In this paper, we have curated CAVES, the first large-scale dataset containing about 10k COVID-19 anti-vaccine tweets labelled into various specific anti-vaccine concerns in a multi-label setting. This is also the first multi-label classification dataset that provides explanations for each of the labels. Additionally, the dataset also provides class-wise summaries of all the tweets. We also perform preliminary experiments on the dataset and show that this is a very challenging dataset for multi-label explainable classification and tweet summarization, as is evident by the moderate scores achieved by some state-of-the-art models. © 2022 ACM.

16.
Revista Brasileira de Estudos Politicos ; 124:255-289, 2022.
Article in English, Portuguese | Scopus | ID: covidwho-1964595

ABSTRACT

The anti-vaccine movements have gained expressiveness in recent years, leading to the realization that diseases, previously eradicated, started to return. The pandemic of the new coronavirus rekindled the debate, leading the Supreme Court to consider constitutional compulsory vaccination, never forced, provided that, among other requirements, immunizers have a scientific basis. Adopting the phenomenological method, combined with the case study - by analyzing the decisions of the STF on the matter –, and the method of bibliographic approach, this article aims to analyze to what extent the STF effectively closed the question about the State having (or not) the power to compel the individual to be vaccinated. The first section is dedicated to the study of anti-vaccine movements, with data exposure and the historical resumption of the movement. The second section analyzes the decisions of the STF, issued at the end of 2020, as well as the operation of the rhetoric of truth in contemporary times and the relationship of mandatory vaccination with the principles of bioethics. The discussion on the credibility of the safety and efficacy of vaccines, to justify the compulsory application, goes beyond legal and political limits, deflating the decision of the Superior Court. Therefore, it appears that the STF did not resolve the issue, it only relegated the debate to science and the formation of truth in contemporary times. © 2022

17.
Vaccines (Basel) ; 10(6)2022 Jun 10.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1911682

ABSTRACT

Even though vaccination is the most effective measure against COVID-19 infections, vaccine rollout efforts have been hampered by growing anti-vaccine attitudes. Based on current knowledge, we identified three domains (beliefs, discrimination, and news) as our correlates of primary interest to examine the association with anti-vaccine attitudes. This is one of the first studies to examine key correlates of anti-vaccine attitudes during the critical early stages of vaccine implementation in the United States. An online survey was administered in May 2021 to a non-representative, nationally based sample of adults (N = 789). Using multivariable logistic regression analysis, we found that individuals who expressed worry about COVID-19 (OR = 0.34, 95% CI 0.21, 0.55) and had greater knowledge of COVID-19 (OR = 0.50, 95% CI 0.25, 0.99) were less likely to hold anti-vaccine attitudes. Conversely, individuals who held stigmatizing views of COVID-19 (OR = 2.47, 95% CI 1.53, 3.99), had experienced racial discrimination (OR = 2.14, 95% CI 1.25, 3.67) and discrimination related to COVID-19 (OR = 2.84, 95% CI 1.54, 5.24), and who had been watching Fox News (OR = 3.95, 95% CI 2.61, 5.97) were more likely to hold anti-vaccine attitudes. These findings suggest COVID-19 beliefs, experiences of discrimination, and news sources should be considered when designing targeted approaches to address the anti-vaccine movement.

18.
J Med Internet Res ; 24(7): e37806, 2022 07 06.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1902840

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Vaccines serve an integral role in containing pandemics, yet vaccine hesitancy is prevalent globally. One key reason for this hesitancy is the pervasiveness of misinformation on social media. Although considerable research attention has been drawn to how exposure to misinformation is closely associated with vaccine hesitancy, little scholarly attention has been given to the investigation or robust theorizing of the various content themes pertaining to antivaccine misinformation about COVID-19 and the writing strategies in which these content themes are manifested. Virality of such content on social media exhibited in the form of comments, shares, and reactions has practical implications for COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy. OBJECTIVE: We investigated whether there were differences in the content themes and writing strategies used to disseminate antivaccine misinformation about COVID-19 and their impact on virality on social media. METHODS: We constructed an antivaccine misinformation database from major social media platforms during September 2019-August 2021 to examine how misinformation exhibited in the form of content themes and how these themes manifested in writing were associated with virality in terms of likes, comments, and shares. Antivaccine misinformation was retrieved from two globally leading and widely cited fake news databases, COVID Global Misinformation Dashboard and International Fact-Checking Network Corona Virus Facts Alliance Database, which aim to track and debunk COVID-19 misinformation. We primarily focused on 140 Facebook posts, since most antivaccine misinformation posts on COVID-19 were found on Facebook. We then employed quantitative content analysis to examine the content themes (ie, safety concerns, conspiracy theories, efficacy concerns) and manifestation strategies of misinformation (ie, mimicking of news and scientific reports in terms of the format and language features, use of a conversational style, use of amplification) in these posts and their association with virality of misinformation in the form of likes, comments, and shares. RESULTS: Our study revealed that safety concern was the most prominent content theme and a negative predictor of likes and shares. Regarding the writing strategies manifested in content themes, a conversational style and mimicking of news and scientific reports via the format and language features were frequently employed in COVID-19 antivaccine misinformation, with the latter being a positive predictor of likes. CONCLUSIONS: This study contributes to a richer research-informed understanding of which concerns about content theme and manifestation strategy need to be countered on antivaccine misinformation circulating on social media so that accurate information on COVID-19 vaccines can be disseminated to the public, ultimately reducing vaccine hesitancy. The liking of COVID-19 antivaccine posts that employ language features to mimic news or scientific reports is perturbing since a large audience can be reached on social media, potentially exacerbating the spread of misinformation and hampering global efforts to combat the virus.


Subject(s)
COVID-19 , Social Media , COVID-19/prevention & control , COVID-19 Vaccines/therapeutic use , Communication , Humans , Writing
19.
Debats-Revista De Cultura Poder I Societat ; 136(1):118-130, 2022.
Article in Catalan | Web of Science | ID: covidwho-1894195

ABSTRACT

The aim of this present research was to test whether the discourse of groups opposed to the acceptance of COVID-19 preventive measures could be framed within conspiracy theories and to analyse their arguments. This study was conducted using quantitative methodology by applying the technique of content analysis to the messages sent within the denialist collective Docentes por la Verdad Telegram mesanging application group. The data collection timeframe was from December 2020 (when vaccination against COVID-19 started) to May 2021 (when the vaccination schedule for the majority of teachers ended). Systematic sampling with the function K = N/n was used to select sufficient days within this aforementioned date range to comply with a 95% confidence level and error of 5%, resulting in a sample of 124 from a total of 182 days. The pre-coding of the analysis was based on Brotherton's (2013) characterisation of conspiracy theories and the denialist arguments detected by the Comision Central de Deontologia de la Organizacion Medica Colegial (Central Commission of Deontology of the Spanish Medical Association;2020). The results showed that these collectives can be considered conspiracy groups and reaffirmed the arguments of other research groups while also adding some new lines of enquiry.

20.
2022 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI 2022 ; 2022.
Article in English | Scopus | ID: covidwho-1874710

ABSTRACT

Vaccine hesitancy has always been a public health concern, and anti-vaccine campaigns that proliferate disinformation have gained traction across the US in the last 25 years. The demographics of resistance are varied, with health, religious, and, increasingly, political concerns cited as reasons. With the COVID-19 pandemic igniting the fastest development of vaccines to date, mis- and disinformation about them have become inflammatory, with campaigning allegedly including racial targeting. Through a primarily qualitative investigation, this study inductively examines a large online vaccine discussion space that invokes references to the unethical Tuskegee Syphilis Study to understand how tactics of racial targeting of Black Americans might appear publicly. We find that such targeting is entangled with a genuine discussion about medical racism and vaccine hesitancy. Across 12 distinct voices that address race, medical racism, and vaccines, we discuss how mis- and disinformation sit alongside accurate information in a "polyvocal"space. © 2022 Owner/Author.

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