COVID-19 Vaccination and Mental Health: A Difference-In-Difference Analysis of the Understanding America Study

This article has been Reviewed by the following groups

Read the full article See related articles

Abstract

No abstract available

Article activity feed

  1. SciScore for 10.1101/2021.07.19.21260782: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Ethicsnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    We also adjusted for several time-varying, self-reported covariates: receiving Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits in the month prior to the survey, receiving unemployment insurance past 14 days, and employment status at the time of the survey.
    Nutrition Assistance Program
    suggested: None
    SNAP
    suggested: (SNAP, RRID:SCR_007936)

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).


    Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:
    As with all observational analyses, our study has clear limitations. First, measurements of both the distress and vaccination rely on self-report, which may be biased. Second, the web-based sample may not be truly representative of the US population and individuals from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups. Third, our analysis was designed to capture only the direct effect of an individual becoming vaccinated on their own mental health. However, vaccination is likely to have myriad positive spillover effects on mental health that are not captured in this study. Mental health may improve as friends and family become vaccinated, as the economy rebounds, as community prevalence of virus falls, and as fewer people suffer major illness or death. The respondents in the UCA study likely benefited from vaccine scale-up beyond their own vaccination status. Additionally, their getting vaccinated likely benefited other peoples’ mental health. As a result, our findings likely substantially underestimate the beneficial effect of vaccination for mental health at the population level. Notwithstanding these limitations, our study has several key strengths. First, to our knowledge, this is the first study to assess the psychological impacts of COVID-19 vaccination. Second, our main findings are robust to time-varying controls, individual and wave fixed effects, and several alternative modelling strategies. Importantly, our analyses were robust to state-by-wave fixed effects, ruling out c...

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.


    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.


    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.


    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    Results from scite Reference Check: We found no unreliable references.


    About SciScore

    SciScore is an automated tool that is designed to assist expert reviewers by finding and presenting formulaic information scattered throughout a paper in a standard, easy to digest format. SciScore checks for the presence and correctness of RRIDs (research resource identifiers), and for rigor criteria such as sex and investigator blinding. For details on the theoretical underpinning of rigor criteria and the tools shown here, including references cited, please follow this link.