The Expected Utility of Vaccination: Parental Choices From a Decision–Making Framework

Abstract

Vaccine hesitancy amongst parents remains a concern for child welfare and for the wider community. Although vaccination is an archetypal scenario within the decision–making domain, there is currently no research that measures utility weightings of possible vaccination outcomes, and how these change under intervention. The aim of this study is to directly measure individual estimates of vaccination outcomes and attempt to influence vaccination choices through disease education, rather than mitigation of autism fears. Participants (n = 413) were recruited online, invited to review information from one of three conditions and answer a series of questions relating to vaccine choices. Results found information about diseases could significantly influence preferences between diseases, and affect estimates of how bad those diseases were. Disease information did not influence vaccination attitudes or intent beyond that of Control however, contrary to expectations, attitudes responded best to direct factual negation. Expected Utility measurements could predict vaccination intent to a significant degree. Findings suggest that information about diseases can decrease the utility of disease, but severity estimates are less reliable. Attitudes respond better to directly relevant information, which helps to decrease uncertainty around vaccination. Findings are discussed in terms of position within the broader vaccine literature.