Sheldenkar Anita, Ling Tng Pei, Schulz Peter Johannes, Chen Mark I-Cheng, Lwin May Oo
Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
Vaccine. 2025 Jan 25;45:126643. doi: 10.1016/j.vaccine.2024.126643. Epub 2024 Dec 24.
Trust in governments has been decreasing in recent years, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic, where low-trust societies showed reduced compliance with disease control measures. Few studies have examined how trust in authorities changed over the pandemic. This study investigated the trajectory of public trust in the Singapore government's vaccine recommendations during this period.
1138 participants completed three online surveys between June 2021 and April 2022. Variables included traditional and online media use, sense of duty to follow government recommendations, self-efficacy in protecting oneself without vaccination, perceived vaccine benefits and trust in government vaccine advice. Growth models were used to examine trends in trust over time.
Trust in government vaccine advice decreased during the pandemic. Traditional media use was positively related to trust in government while online media use showed a negative association. Respondents who viewed following government vaccine recommendations as their choice were less likely to trust the government longitudinally than those who perceived it as their duty. Traditional media users who viewed following advice as their duty had the highest trust across time, while the lowest trust was observed for online media users who viewed following recommendations as their choice. While respondents with higher self-efficacy in protecting against Covid-19 without vaccination showed less trust in the government initially, they showed a smaller decrease in trust over time than those with lower self-efficacy. Stronger beliefs in vaccine benefits were associated with slower decrease in trust over time.
This is one of the first studies to investigate government trust longitudinally in Asia during a crisis. Findings indicate that governments of high-trust societies cannot be complacent during health crises. Messaging strategies that cultivate civic mindedness may promote positive vaccination beliefs and government trust. More attention should be paid to mitigating effects of online media information-seeking on government trust during crises.
近年来，民众对政府的信任度一直在下降，尤其是在新冠疫情期间，信任度较低的社会对疾病控制措施的遵守程度较低。很少有研究探讨在疫情期间民众对当局的信任是如何变化的。本研究调查了在此期间新加坡公众对政府疫苗建议的信任轨迹。
1138名参与者在2021年6月至2022年4月期间完成了三项在线调查。变量包括传统媒体和网络媒体的使用情况、遵循政府建议的责任感、未接种疫苗时自我保护的自我效能感、感知到的疫苗益处以及对政府疫苗建议的信任度。使用增长模型来研究信任度随时间的变化趋势。
在疫情期间，民众对政府疫苗建议的信任度下降。传统媒体的使用与对政府的信任呈正相关，而网络媒体的使用则呈负相关。将遵循政府疫苗建议视为个人选择的受访者，从纵向来看，比那些将其视为责任的受访者更不信任政府。将遵循建议视为责任的传统媒体使用者在各个时间段的信任度最高，而将遵循建议视为个人选择的网络媒体使用者的信任度最低。虽然在未接种疫苗的情况下对新冠病毒具有较高自我保护效能感 的受访者最初对政府的信任度较低，但随着时间的推移，他们的信任度下降幅度比自我效能感较低的受访者要小。对疫苗益处的信念越强，信任度随时间下降的速度就越慢。
这是亚洲首批在危机期间纵向调查政府信任度的研究之一。研究结果表明，高信任度社会的政府在健康危机期间不能掉以轻心。培养公民意识的信息传播策略可能会促进积极的疫苗接种信念和对政府的信任。在危机期间，应更加关注减轻网络媒体信息搜索对政府信任的影响。
