Mind the Vaccination Gap: Understanding and Overcoming the Racial/Ethnic Inequalities in COVID-19 Vaccination Acceptance

With the constant threat of new epidemic waves and the emergence of variants, COVID-19 resilience can only be attained when a sufficient level of immunity is achieved. Yet, in the US and the UK, COVID-19 vaccination campaigns have failed to secure consistent vaccination acceptance in racial/ethnic minority communities. Despite racial/ethnic minorities being more at risk from COVID-19, they are less vaccinated than the White majority. The investigators propose that current vaccination invitation messages are deemed less trustworthy by racial/ethnic minorities than the White majority and that this might partly explain reduced vaccination acceptance. To provide causal evidence of the role of trust and actionable insights, the investigators will experimentally assess the benefits of new invitation messages to receive the COVID-19 booster dose in large, racially/ethnically diverse samples in the US and the UK. Results will evidence how to increase message and source trustworthiness to foster trust and vaccination acceptance across racial/ethnic groups.