Visual policy narrative messaging improves COVID-19 vaccine uptake

Abstract

In the face of vaccine hesitancy, public health officials are seeking more effective risk communication approaches to increase vaccination rates. We test the influence of visual policy narratives on COVID-19 vaccination behavior through a panel survey experiment conducted in early 2021 (n = 3,900) and then 8 weeks later (n = 2,268). We examine the effects of three visual policy narrative messages that test the narrative mechanism of character selection (yourself, your circle, and your community) and a nonnarrative control on COVID-19 vaccine behavior. Visual risk messages that use narratives positively influence COVID-19 vaccination through serial mediation of affective response to the messages and motivation to get the COVID-19 vaccination. Additionally, character selection matters, as messages focusing on protecting others (i.e. your circle and your community) perform stronger than those of yourself. Political ideology moderated some of the effects, with conservative respondents in the nonnarrative control condition having a higher probability of vaccination in comparison to the protect yourself condition. Taken together, these results suggest that public health officials should use narrative-based visual communication messages that emphasize communal benefits of vaccinations.

You are a hero! The influence of audience‐as‐hero narratives on policy support

“…A second narrative, portraying a nonaudience firefighter hero, has no statistically significant effect. This finding confirms the importance of the audience's identification with a narrative's character for narrative transportation and persuasion (Jones, 2014;Raile et al, 2022;Shanahan et al, 2023). In addition, it demonstrates the power of the audience-as-hero character, even in comparison to one of the most heroic characters, the firefighter.…”

“…A narrative with the audience as a hero is, therefore, expected to have more persuasive power than a narrative portraying another hero. Recent NPF studies have situated the target audience as a hero (Raile et al, 2022;Shanahan et al, 2023) and found that messages featuring the audience as a hero were effective in influencing policy opinion. However, these studies kept the audience as a hero constant and did not compare audience-as-hero narratives with narratives portraying other heroes.…”

“…This article draws on the Narrative Policy Framework (NPF) to compare the influence of different hero characters on the opinion about a campfire regulation among visitors to a national park in Russia. While recent NPF studies have portrayed the audience of a narrative as a hero (e.g., Raile et al, 2022;Shanahan et al, 2023), no NPF study to date has compared the influence of narratives that construct the audience as a hero (audience-as-hero narratives) with narratives portraying other heroes. This article addresses this gap and argues that narratives that depict a regulation's target group as a hero are most effective in generating support for this regulation.…”

Cost-based COVID-19 vaccination and willingness to pay: A post-pandemic review

“…A recent study aimed at identifying effective communication strategies to boost vaccination rates examined the impact of different messages on COVID-19 vaccine acceptance. 42 These messages included those highlighting vaccine safety, personal benefits, benefits to others, and the return to normalcy. The study revealed that the most effective message focused on personal health benefits.…”

Navigating the Evolving Landscape of COVID-19: Strategies to Increase Vaccine Confidence and Improve Vaccination Rates in the United States

“…The success of the public health vaccination program is contingent on a simple narrative on the role of vaccines to protect the individual, their circle of contacts and their community. [49] Vaccine messaging is crucial. Simply providing individuals with more vaccine and disease information was shown in one study to increase misperceptions or reduce vaccination intention.…”