Lackner Christine L, Wang Charles H
Psychology Department, Mount St Vincent University, Halifax, NS, Canada.
Performance and Analytics, Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Center, Halifax, NS, Canada.
Psychol Rep. 2023 Nov 29;128(6):332941231219644. doi: 10.1177/00332941231219644.
The Centre for Disease Control recommends vaccination of children against SARS-CoV-2 to reduce the severity of COVID-19 disease and reduce the likelihood of associated complications. Vaccination of children requires the consent of parents or guardians, and levels of consent may ebb and flow over the course of the pandemic. This exploratory study examines predictors of parental intentions to vaccinate their children and the speed with which they would have them vaccinated during the fifth wave of the pandemic when vaccines were just being approved for use in children using a convenience sample of 641 parents reporting on 962 children. Multi-level regression analyses demonstrated regional differences in likelihood, with those in the Northeast reporting higher likelihood than those in the West. Parents with a conservative belief system were less likely to want to have their children vaccinated. Parents were more likely to have their child vaccinated if the child had COVID-19-related health risks, their child had a more complete vaccination history, and COVID-19 was perceived to be a greater threat to oneself and one's family. Faster intended vaccination speed was associated with regional urbanicity, liberal belief systems, more complete vaccination histories, and parental COVID-19 vaccination history. Higher levels of parental anxiety and lower levels of perceived vaccine danger were associated with increased speed. The severity of the COVID-19 pandemic within one's county was marginally related to speed, but not likelihood. These results underscore the importance of regular assessment of parental intentions across the pandemic, for practitioners to probe parental anxiety levels when discussing vaccination, to explicitly address risk/benefit analyses when communicating with parents, and to target previously routine unvaccinated parents and those in more rural areas to increase vaccine uptake. Comparisons are made with Galanis et al.'s (2022) recent meta-analysis on the topic.
疾病控制中心建议对儿童接种新冠病毒疫苗，以减轻新冠肺炎病情的严重程度，并降低相关并发症的发生可能性。儿童接种疫苗需要父母或监护人的同意，而在疫情期间，同意的程度可能会有所波动。这项探索性研究调查了父母让孩子接种疫苗的意愿的预测因素，以及在疫情第五波期间，当疫苗刚被批准用于儿童时，他们让孩子接种疫苗的速度。研究采用了一个便利样本，包括641名报告962名儿童情况的家长。多层次回归分析显示，不同地区在接种可能性上存在差异，东北部地区的家长报告的接种可能性高于西部地区。具有保守信仰体系的家长让孩子接种疫苗的意愿较低。如果孩子有与新冠相关的健康风险、孩子的疫苗接种史更完整，以及家长认为新冠对自己和家人的威胁更大，那么家长让孩子接种疫苗的可能性就更大。更快的接种意愿速度与地区城市化程度、自由的信仰体系、更完整的疫苗接种史以及家长的新冠疫苗接种史有关。较高水平的家长焦虑和较低水平的感知疫苗危险性与更快的接种速度相关。所在县内新冠疫情的严重程度与接种速度略有相关，但与接种可能性无关。这些结果强调了在整个疫情期间定期评估家长意愿的重要性，对于从业者来说，在讨论疫苗接种时要探究家长的焦虑程度，在与家长沟通时要明确进行风险/收益分析，并针对以前未接种疫苗的常规家长和农村地区的家长，以提高疫苗接种率。文中还与加拉尼斯等人（2022年）最近关于该主题的荟萃分析进行了比较。
