Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom.
Department of Psychology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom.
PLoS One. 2021 Nov 17;16(11):e0259048. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0259048. eCollection 2021.
The quality of evidence about the effectiveness of non-pharmaceutical health interventions is often low, but little is known about the effects of communicating indications of evidence quality to the public.
In two blinded, randomised, controlled, online experiments, US participants (total n = 2140) were shown one of several versions of an infographic illustrating the effectiveness of eye protection in reducing COVID-19 transmission. Their trust in the information, understanding, feelings of effectiveness of eye protection, and the likelihood of them adopting it were measured.
Compared to those given no quality cues, participants who were told the quality of the evidence on eye protection was 'low', rated the evidence less trustworthy (p = .001, d = 0.25), and rated it as subjectively less effective (p = .018, d = 0.19). The same effects emerged compared to those who were told the quality of the evidence was 'high', and in one of the two studies, those shown 'low' quality of evidence said they were less likely to use eye protection (p = .005, d = 0.18). Participants who were told the quality of the evidence was 'high' showed no statistically significant differences on these measures compared to those given no information about evidence quality.
Without quality of evidence cues, participants responded to the evidence about the public health intervention as if it was high quality and this affected their subjective perceptions of its efficacy and trust in the provided information. This raises the ethical dilemma of weighing the importance of transparently stating when the evidence base is actually low quality against evidence that providing such information can decrease trust, perception of intervention efficacy, and likelihood of adopting it.
非药物卫生干预措施有效性的证据质量通常较低，但对于向公众传达证据质量指示的效果知之甚少。
在两项双盲、随机、对照、在线实验中，美国参与者（共 2140 人）观看了几种说明眼部保护降低 COVID-19 传播效果的信息图版本之一。他们对信息的信任度、理解程度、眼部保护效果的主观感受以及采用它的可能性进行了测量。
与未提供质量提示的参与者相比，被告知眼部保护证据质量“低”的参与者认为证据的可信度较低（p=0.001，d=0.25），并认为其主观效果较差（p=0.018，d=0.19）。与被告知证据质量“高”的参与者相比，也出现了同样的效果，在两项研究中的一项中，那些被提示“低”质量证据的参与者表示他们不太可能使用眼部保护（p=0.005，d=0.18）。与未提供证据质量信息的参与者相比，被告知证据质量“高”的参与者在这些测量指标上没有显示出统计学上的显著差异。
在没有证据质量提示的情况下，参与者对公共卫生干预措施的证据做出了反应，就好像它是高质量的，这影响了他们对其疗效的主观感知和对所提供信息的信任。这引发了一个伦理困境，即权衡透明说明证据基础实际上质量较低的重要性与提供此类信息可能降低信任度、干预效果感知和采用它的可能性之间的重要性。
