Abstract
Vaccine communication is a scientifically complex, ethically laden, and highly multidisciplinary area in which to conduct research or practice. Due to vaccination’s status as a key topic in public health and medicine, communication about vaccination serves as fertile ground for social scientific and critical research that can both improve health and help us understand health-related values, mental models, and discourses. This chapter presents the background necessary to understand vaccine communication as a topic of study, provides an overview of contemporary communication research about vaccines and vaccination, and describes frameworks for addressing ethical considerations particular to vaccine communication.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
Structural barriers are obstacles that disproportionately affect some groups within society, for example: lack of parental leave time for child medical appointments, lack of transportation or long travel time to medical care, long waits for vaccination appointments, co-payments or fees for vaccinations, health systems that are difficult to navigate, and biased healthcare providers who discourage care-seeking.
References
Beauchamp, T. L., & Childress, J. F. (2013). Principles of biomedical ethics (7th ed.). Oxford University Press.
Berezin, M., & Eads, A. (2016). Risk is for the rich? Childhood vaccination resistance and a Culture of Health. Social Science & Medicine, 165, 233–245. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2016.07.009.
Betsch, C., Renkewitz, F., Betsch, T., & Ulshöfer, C. (2010). The influence of vaccine-critical websites on perceiving vaccination risks. Journal of Health Psychology, 15(3), 446–455. https://doi.org/10.1177/1359105309353647.
Broniatowski, D. A., Jamison, A. M., Qi, S., AlKulaib, L., Chen, T., Benton, A., Quinn, S. C., & Dredze, M. (2018). Weaponized health communication: Twitter bots and Russian trolls amplify the vaccine debate. American Journal of Public Health, 108(10), 1378–1384. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2018.304567.
Burgess, J. T. F., Knox, E., & Hauptman, R. (2019). Foundations of information ethics. ALA Neal-Schuman.
Bushar, J. A., Kendrick, J. S., Ding, H., Black, C. L., & Greby, S. M. (2017). Text4baby influenza messaging and influenza vaccination among pregnant women. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 53(6), 845–853. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amepre.2017.06.021.
Busse, J. W., Walji, R., & Wilson, K. (2011). Parents’ experiences discussing pediatric vaccination with healthcare providers: A survey of Canadian naturopathic patients. PLoS ONE, 6(8), e22737. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0022737.
Capurro, G., Greenberg, J., Dubé, E., & Driedger, M. (2018). Measles, moral regulation and the social construction of risk: Media narratives of “Anti-Vaxxers” and the 2015 Disneyland outbreak. Canadian Journal of Sociology, 43(1), 25–48. https://doi.org/10.29173/cjs29301.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2020, August 14). GBS (Guillain-Barré Syndrome) and Vaccines. Vaccine Safety, Questions and Concerns. Retrieved on November 30, 2020, from https://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/concerns/guillain-barre-syndrome.html.
Clarke, C. E., Dixon, G. N., Holton, A., & McKeever, B. W. (2015). Including “evidentiary balance” in news media coverage of vaccine risk. Health Communication, 30(5), 461–472. https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2013.867006.
Cummings, C. L., & Kong, W. Y. (2019). “Influenza” versus “flu”: Do different medical terms affect vaccination intention? Journal of Health Communication, 24(4), 456–460. https://doi.org/10.1080/10810730.2019.1630527.
Daley, M. F., Narwaney, K. J., Shoup, J. A., Wagner, N. M., & Glanz, J. M. (2018). Addressing parents’ vaccine concerns: A randomized trial of a social media intervention. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 55(1), 44–54. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amepre.2018.04.010.
Dawson, A. (Ed.). (2011). Public health ethics: Key concepts and issues in policy and practice. Cambridge University Press.
Dawson, A., & Verweij, M. (2008). Public health ethics: A manifesto. Public Health Ethics, 1(1), 1–2. https://doi.org/10.1093/phe/phn009.
Dubé, E., Gagnon, D., Kaminsky, K., Green, C. R., Ouakki, M., Bettinger, J. A., Brousseau, N., Castillo, E., Crowcroft, N. S., Driedger, S. M., Greyson, D., Fell, D., Fisher, W., Gagneur, A., Guay, M., Halperin, D., Halperin, S. A., MacDonald, S., Meyer, S. B., … Cook, J. L. (2018). Vaccination against influenza in pregnancy: A survey of Canadian maternity care providers. Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology Canada, 41(4), 479–488. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jogc.2018.09.007.
Dyer, O. (2017). Measles outbreak in Somali American community follows anti-vaccine talks. BMJ, 357. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.j2378.
European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. (2017). Catalogue of interventions addressing vaccine hesitancy. ECDC. http://dx.publications.europa.eu/10.2900/654210.
Fadda, M., Galimberti, E., Fiordelli, M., Romanò, L., Zanetti, A., & Schulz, P. J. (2017). Effectiveness of a smartphone app to increase parents’ knowledge and empowerment in the MMR vaccination decision: A randomized controlled trial. Human Vaccines & Immunotherapeutics, 13(11), 2512–2521. https://doi.org/10.1080/21645515.2017.1360456.
Fairchild, A. L., & Bayer, R. (2004). Ethics and the Conduct of Public Health Surveillance. Science, 303(5658), 631–632. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1094038.
Fairchild, A. L., & Bayer, R. (2011). HIV surveillance, public health, and clinical medicine—Will the walls come tumbling down? New England Journal of Medicine, 365(8), 685–687. https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMp1107294.
Frohlich, K. L., Mykhalovskiy, E., Poland, B. D., Haines-Saah, R., & Johnson, J. (2012). Creating the socially marginalised youth smoker: The role of tobacco control. Sociology of Health & Illness, 34(7), 978–993. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9566.2011.01449.x.
Gianfredi, V., Moretti, M., & Lopalco, P. L. (2019). Countering vaccine hesitancy through immunization information systems, a narrative review. Human Vaccines & Immunotherapeutics, 15(11), 2508–2526. https://doi.org/10.1080/21645515.2019.1599675.
Giubilini, A., Douglas, T., & Savulescu, J. (2018). The moral obligation to be vaccinated: Utilitarianism, contractualism, and collective easy rescue. Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy, 21(4), 547–560. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11019-018-9829-y.
Grant, L., Hausman, B. L., Cashion, M., Lucchesi, N., Patel, K., & Roberts, J. (2015). Vaccination persuasion online: A qualitative study of two provaccine and two vaccine-skeptical websites. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 17(5), e133. https://doi.org/10.2196/jmir.4153.
Greenberg, J., Dubé, E., & Driedger, M. (2017). Vaccine hesitancy: In search of the risk communication comfort zone. PLoS Currents, 9. https://doi.org/10.1371/currents.outbreaks.0561a011117a1d1f9596e24949e8690b.
Greenwood, B. (2014). The contribution of vaccination to global health: Past, present and future. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 369(1645). https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2013.0433.
Greyson, D., Knight, R., & Shoveller, J. A. (2019). Ethics, effectiveness and population health information interventions: A Canadian analysis. Health Promotion International, 34(3), 501–509. https://doi.org/10.1093/heapro/day004.
Greyson, D., Vriesema-Magnuson, C., & Bettinger, J. A. (2019). Impact of school vaccination mandates on pediatric vaccination coverage: A systematic review. CMAJ Open, 7(3), E524–E536. https://doi.org/10.9778/cmajo.20180191.
Gutteling, J. M., & Kuttschreuter, M. (2002). The role of expertise in risk communication: Laypeople’s and expert’s perception of the millennium bug risk in The Netherlands. Journal of Risk Research, 5(1), 35–47. https://doi.org/10.1080/13669870010029639.
Guttman, N. (1997). Ethical dilemmas in health campaigns. Health Communication, 9(2), 155. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327027hc0902_3.
Guttman, N., & Salmon, C. T. (2004). Guilt, fear, stigma and knowledge gaps: Ethical issues in public health communication interventions. Bioethics, 18(6), 531–552. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8519.2004.00415.x.
Haase, N., Betsch, C., & Renkewitz, F. (2015). Source credibility and the biasing effect of narrative information on the perception of vaccination risks. Journal of Health Communication, 20(8), 920–929. https://doi.org/10.1080/10810730.2015.1018605.
Hauptman, R. (1988). Ethical challenges in librarianship. Oryx Press.
Healthdirect Australia. (2019, June 7). Immunisation or vaccination—What’s the difference? [Text/html]. Healthdirect Australia. https://www.healthdirect.gov.au/immunisation-or-vaccination-whats-the-difference.
Heaven, W. D. (2020). Predictive policing algorithms are racist. They need to be dismantled. MIT Technology Review. https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/17/1005396/predictive-policing-algorithms-racist-dismantled-machine-learning-bias-criminal-justice/.
Holland, S. (2007). Public health ethics. Polity.
Jarrett, C., Wilson, R., O’Leary, M., Eckersberger, E., & Larson, H. J. (2015). Strategies for addressing vaccine hesitancy—A systematic review. Vaccine, 33(34), 4180–4190. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.vaccine.2015.04.040.
Kalichman, S. C., & Kegler, C. (2015). Vaccine-related internet search activity predicts H1N1 and HPV vaccine coverage: Implications for vaccine acceptance. Journal of Health Communication, 20(3), 259–265. https://doi.org/10.1080/10810730.2013.852274.
Kasting, M. L., Head, K. J., Cox, D., Cox, A. D., & Zimet, G. D. (2019). The effects of message framing and healthcare provider recommendation on adult hepatitis B vaccination: A randomized controlled trial. Preventive Medicine, 127, 105798. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ypmed.2019.105798.
Kata, A. (2012). Anti-vaccine activists, Web 2.0, and the postmodern paradigm—An overview of tactics and tropes used online by the anti-vaccination movement. Vaccine, 30(25), 3778–3789. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.vaccine.2011.11.112.
Kaufman, J., Attwell, K., Hauck, Y., Omer, S. B., & Danchin, M. (2019). Vaccine discussions in pregnancy: Interviews with midwives to inform design of an intervention to promote uptake of maternal and childhood vaccines. Human Vaccines & Immunotherapeutics, 15(11), 2534–2543. https://doi.org/10.1080/21645515.2019.1607131.
Lazo, J. K., Kinnell, J. C., & Fisher, A. (2000). Expert and layperson perceptions of ecosystem risk. Risk Analysis, 20(2), 179–194. https://doi.org/10.1111/0272-4332.202019.
Leask, J., Kinnersley, P., Jackson, C., Cheater, F., Bedford, H., & Rowles, G. (2012). Communicating with parents about vaccination: A framework for health professionals. BMC Pediatrics, 12(1), 154. https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2431-12-154.
Lee, L. M., & Thacker, S. B. (2011). The cornerstone of public health practice: Public health surveillance, 1961–2011. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, 60(4), 15–21.
Lewin, S., Hill, S., Abdullahi, L. H., de Castro Freire, S. B., Bosch-Capblanch, X., Glenton, C., Hussey, G. D., Jones, C. M., Kaufman, J., Lin, V., Mahomed, H., Rhoda, L., Robinson, P., Waggie, Z., Willis, N., & Wiysonge, C. S. (2011). “Communicate to vaccinate” (COMMVAC). building evidence for improving communication about childhood vaccinations in low- and middle-income countries: Protocol for a programme of research. Implementation Science: IS, 6, 125. https://doi.org/10.1186/1748-5908-6-125.
Lupton, D. (2014). Risk (2nd ed). Routledge.
Lyerla, R., & Stroup, D. F. (2018). Toward a public health surveillance system for behavioral health. Public Health Reports, 133(4), 360–365. https://doi.org/10.1177/0033354918772547.
Lyon, D. (1994). The electronic eye: The rise of surveillance society: Computers and social control in context. Polity Press.
MacDonald, N. E., & SAGE Working Group on Vaccine Hesitancy. (2015). Vaccine hesitancy: Definition, scope and determinants. Vaccine, 33(34), 4161–4164. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.vaccine.2015.04.036.
Marcus, B. (2020). A nursing approach to the largest measles outbreak in recent U.S. history: Lessons learned battling homegrown vaccine hesitancy. Online Journal of Issues in Nursing, 25(1). https://doi.org/10.3912/OJIN.Vol25No01Man03.
Meppelink, C. S., Smit, E. G., Fransen, M. L., & Diviani, N. (2019). “I was right about vaccination”: Confirmation bias and health literacy in online health information seeking. Journal of Health Communication, 24(2), 129–140. https://doi.org/10.1080/10810730.2019.1583701.
Meyer, S. B., Lu, S. K., Hoffman-Goetz, L., Smale, B., MacDougall, H., & Pearce, A. R. (2016). A content analysis of newspaper coverage of the seasonal flu vaccine in Ontario, Canada, October 2001 to March 2011. Journal of Health Communication, 21(10), 1088–1097. https://doi.org/10.1080/10810730.2016.1222038.
Moore, A. D. (2005). Information ethics: Privacy, property, and power. University of Washington Press.
Moyer-Gusé, E., Robinson, M. J., & Mcknight, J. (2018). The role of humor in messaging about the MMR vaccine. Journal of Health Communication, 23(6), 514–522. https://doi.org/10.1080/10810730.2018.1473533.
Muralikrishna, I. V., & Manickam, V. (2017). Environmental risk assessment. In I. V. Muralikrishna & V. Manickam (Eds.), Environmental management (pp. 135–152). Butterworth-Heinemann. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-811989-1.00008-7.
Nan, X. (2012). Communicating to young adults about HPV vaccination: Consideration of message framing, motivation, and gender. Health Communication, 27(1), 10–18. https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2011.567447.
National Communication Association. (2017). Credo for Ethical Communication. Retrieved on November 30, 2020, from https://www.natcom.org/sites/default/files/Public_Statement_Credo_for_Ethical_Communication_2017.pdf.
National Research Council (US) Committee on Risk Perception and Communication. (1989). Improving risk communication. National Academies Press (US). http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK218585/.
Newman, P. A., Seiden, D. S., Roberts, K. J., Kakinami, L., & Duan, N. (2009). A small dose of HIV? HIV vaccine mental models and risk communication. Health Education & Behavior, 36(2), 321–333. https://doi.org/10.1177/1090198107305078.
Nihlén Fahlquist, J. (2018). Vaccine hesitancy and trust. Ethical aspects of risk communication. Scandinavian Journal of Public Health, 46(2), 182–188. https://doi.org/10.1177/1403494817727162.
Nyhan, B., Reifler, J., Richey, S., & Freed, G. L. (2014). Effective messages in vaccine promotion: A randomized trial. Pediatrics, 133(4), 2013–2365. https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2013-2365.
Opel, D. J., Heritage, J., Taylor, J. A., Mangione-Smith, R., Salas, H. S., DeVere, V., Zhou, C., & Robinson, J. D. (2013). The architecture of provider-parent vaccine discussions at health supervision visits. Pediatrics, 132(6), 1037–1046. https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2013-2037.
Oxford Vaccines Group. (2019, January 3). What is a vaccine, and how do vaccines work? Vaccine Knowledge. https://vk.ovg.ox.ac.uk/vk/how-do-vaccines-work.
Poltorak, M., Leach, M., Fairhead, J., & Cassell, J. (2005). ‘MMR talk’ and vaccination choices: An ethnographic study in Brighton. Social Science & Medicine, 61(3), 709–719. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2004.12.014.
Prati, G., Pietrantoni, L., & Zani, B. (2012). Influenza vaccination: The persuasiveness of messages among people aged 65 years and older. Health Communication, 27(5), 413–420. https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2011.606523.
Petts, J. P., & Niemeyer, S. (2004). Health risk communication and amplification: Learning from the MMR vaccination controversy. Health, Risk & Society, 6(1), 7–23. https://doi.org/10.1080/13698570410001678284.
Reich, J. A. (2014). Neoliberal mothering and vaccine refusal imagined gated communities and the privilege of choice. Gender & Society, 28(5), 679–704. https://doi.org/10.1177/0891243214532711.
Reynolds, B., & Seeger, M. W. (2005). Crisis and emergency risk communication as an integrative model. Journal of Health Communication, 10(1), 43–55. https://doi.org/10.1080/10810730590904571.
Ruhrmann, G., & Guenther, L. (2017). Risk communication. Oxford Bibliographies of Communication. https://doi.org/10.1093/OBO/9780199756841-0156.
Sandman, P. M. (2006). Crisis communication best practices: Some quibbles and additions. Journal of Applied Communication Research, 34(3), 257–262. https://doi.org/10.1080/00909880600771619.
Schmid, K. L., Rivers, S. E., Latimer, A. E., & Salovey, P. (2008). Targeting or tailoring? Maximizing resources to create effective health communications. Marketing Health Services, 28(1), 32–37.
Sela, M., & Hilleman, M. R. (2004). Therapeutic vaccines: Realities of today and hopes for tomorrow. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 101(Suppl 2), 14559. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0405924101.
Smith, T. C. (2017). Vaccine rejection and hesitancy: A review and call to action. Open Forum Infectious Diseases, 4(3). https://doi.org/10.1093/ofid/ofx146.
The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. (2018, September 17). Vaccines and Guillain-Barré Syndrome [Text]. Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia Vaccine Education Center; The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. https://www.chop.edu/centers-programs/vaccine-education-center/vaccines-and-other-conditions/guillain-barre-syndrome.
United States Environmental Protection Agency. (2015, August 20). Risk communication [Data and Tools]. US EPA. https://www.epa.gov/risk/risk-communication.
U.S. National Library of Medicine. (2019). Vaccines (immunizations)—overview. MedlinePlus Medical Encyclopedia. https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/002024.htm.
Wiedemann, P. M., Clauberg, M., & Gray, P. C. R. (2011). Risk communication for companies (p. 94) [Guidebook]. Fischer Verlag.
Witteman, H. O., & Zikmund-Fisher, B. J. (2012). The defining characteristics of Web 2.0 and their potential influence in the online vaccination debate. Vaccine, 30(25), 3734–3740. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.vaccine.2011.12.039.
World Health Organization. (2019). Ten threats to global health in 2019. WHO. https://www.who.int/emergencies/ten-threats-to-global-health-in-2019.
World Health Organization. (2020, August 25). Immunizing the public against misinformation. World Health Organization. https://www.who.int/news-room/feature-stories/detail/immunizing-the-public-against-misinformation.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2022 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Greyson, D. (2022). Challenges in Vaccine Communication. In: Elliott, C., Greenberg, J. (eds) Communication and Health. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-4290-6_15
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-4290-6_15
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore
Print ISBN: 978-981-16-4289-0
Online ISBN: 978-981-16-4290-6
eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)