Correlates of intended COVID-19 vaccine acceptance across time and countries: results from a series of cross-sectional surveys

  1. John R Kerr
  2. Claudia R Schneider
  3. Gabriel Recchia
  4. Sarah Dryhurst
  5. Ullrika Sahlin
  6. Carole Dufouil
  7. Pierre Arwidson
  8. Alexandra LJ Freeman
  9. Sander van der Linden

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Abstract

Describe demographical, social and psychological correlates of willingness to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.

Setting

Series of online surveys undertaken between March and October 2020.

Participants

A total of 25 separate national samples (matched to country population by age and sex) in 12 different countries were recruited through online panel providers (n=25 334).

Primary outcome measures

Reported willingness to receive a COVID-19 vaccination.

Results

Reported willingness to receive a vaccine varied widely across samples, ranging from 63% to 88%. Multivariate logistic regression analyses reveal sex (female OR=0.59, 95% CI 0.55 to 0.64), trust in medical and scientific experts (OR=1.28, 95% CI 1.22 to 1.34) and worry about the COVID-19 virus (OR=1.47, 95% CI 1.41 to 1.53) as the strongest correlates of stated vaccine acceptance considering pooled data and the most consistent correlates across countries. In a subset of UK samples, we show that these effects are robust after controlling for attitudes towards vaccination in general.

Conclusions

Our results indicate that the burden of trust largely rests on the shoulders of the scientific and medical community, with implications for how future COVID-19 vaccination information should be communicated to maximise uptake.

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  1. Version published to 10.1136/bmjopen-2020-048025
  2. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2020.12.09.20246439: (What is this?)

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

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board StatementConsent: All participants were directed via a study link to the Qualtrics platform, and provided informed consent before completing the survey.
    IRB: This study was overseen by the University of Cambridge Psychology Research Ethics Committee (PRE.2020.034).
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    No key resources detected.

    Results from OddPub: Thank you for sharing your data.

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: An explicit section about the limitations of the techniques employed in this study was not found. We encourage authors to address study limitations.

    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.

    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.

  3. Version published to 10.1101/2020.12.09.20246439v1 on medRxiv