NSF-BSF: Willingness to Vaccinate Against COVID-19: Psychological Mechanisms and Ways to Increase Responsiveness

COVID-19疫情已夺去全球超过400万人的生命，超过1. 9亿人受到不同程度的影响。针对冠状病毒的疫苗大大减少了感染人数，挽救了数百万人的生命。然而，尽管该疫苗已被证明是高度有效的，其安全性也令人满意，但在大多数国家，仍有相当大比例的人持反对态度，这危及他们国家以及全世界的全体人口。由于COVID-19继续对人类构成威胁，因此了解导致这种耐药性的原因并找到提高疫苗接种率的方法至关重要。这项研究依赖于以前关于恐怖管理理论的工作，以及最近关于人们死后捐赠器官意愿的工作的见解，提出可能解释人们对疫苗抵抗的心理机制，并提供有效的干预措施来提高疫苗接种率。了解人们对新型冠状病毒疫苗持负面态度和不愿接种疫苗的原因非常重要。这项研究分析了可能影响人们对冠状病毒的态度以及是否接种COVID-19疫苗的多种因素。该研究涉及11个实验，反映了两个研究方向：第一个（第一部分）考察了对COVID-19的不同描述对人们接种疫苗的态度和意愿的影响。操纵增加的想法，挽救生命（而不是死亡）可能会推翻防御机制，可能会产生消极的态度对疫苗，从而增加愿意接种疫苗。其他研究操纵了现状（使不接种疫苗的决定偏离默认情况），并检查了对风险认知和增加疫苗接种意愿的影响。研究的第二部分集中在恐惧和信念的个体差异上，这些差异被假设为在人们决定接种疫苗时发挥主要作用，包括对死亡的恐惧，宗教信仰，对公正世界的信仰和对冒险命运的信仰。该项目由美国国家科学基金会和美国国家科学基金会合作支持。以色列两国科学基金会。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The COVID-19 pandemic has claimed the lives of over 4 million people worldwide, and over 190 million people have been affected in varying degrees of severity. The vaccine against the coronavirus has dramatically reduced the number of infected people, saving the lives of millions. However, although the vaccine has been proved to be highly effective, and its safety profile is satisfactory, in most countries there is still a relatively large percentage of people who are opposed, who endanger the entire population in their country as well as worldwide. Since COVID-19 continues to pose a threat to humans, it is essential to understand what causes this resistance and to find ways to increase vaccination rates. This research relies on previous works on terror management theory, as well as on insights from recent work on people's willingness to donate organs after death, to suggest psychological mechanisms that may explain people’s resistance to the vaccine, and to offer effective interventions to increase vaccination rates.Given the necessity of getting more people vaccinated, understanding the reasons behind peoples’ negative attitudes towards Covid vaccines and their reluctance to be vaccinated is of great importance. This research analyzes the multiple factors that may influence people’s attitudes toward the coronavirus and their decisions to be vaccinated against COVID-19 or not. The study entails 11 experiments reflecting two research directions: The first (Part I) examines the influence of different descriptions of COVID-19 on people’s attitudes and willingness to be vaccinated. Manipulations to increase thoughts of life saving (rather than death) may override defense mechanisms that might create negative attitudes toward the vaccine, thus increasing willingness to vaccinate. Additional studies manipulate the status quo (making the decision not to vaccinate a deviation from the default) and examine the effect on risk perceptions and on increasing willingness to vaccinate. Part II of the studies focus on individual differences in fears and beliefs that are hypothesized to play a major role in people’s decisions about vaccination, including the fear of death, religious beliefs, belief in a just world and belief in tempting fate.This project is being supported by a partnership between the National Science Foundation and the U.S.-Israel Bi-national Science Foundation.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.