Crowdsourcing interventions to promote uptake of COVID-19 booster vaccines

Robert Böhm; Cornelia Betsch; Yana Litovsky; Philipp Sprengholz; Noel T Brewer; Gretchen Chapman; Julie Leask; George Loewenstein; Martha Scherzer; Cass R Sunstein; Michael Kirchler

doi:10.1016/j.eclinm.2022.101632

Crowdsourcing interventions to promote uptake of COVID-19 booster vaccines

EClinicalMedicine. 2022 Nov:53:101632. doi: 10.1016/j.eclinm.2022.101632. Epub 2022 Sep 5.

Authors

Robert Böhm^{1

2

3}, Cornelia Betsch^{4

5

6}, Yana Litovsky⁷, Philipp Sprengholz^{4

6}, Noel T Brewer⁸, Gretchen Chapman⁹, Julie Leask¹⁰, George Loewenstein⁹, Martha Scherzer¹¹, Cass R Sunstein¹², Michael Kirchler⁷

Affiliations

¹ Faculty of Psychology, University of Vienna, Austria.
² Department of Psychology, University of Copenhagen; 1354 Copenhagen K, Denmark.
³ Copenhagen Center for Social Data Science (SODAS), University of Copenhagen, Denmark.
⁴ Media and Communication Science, University of Erfurt, Germany.
⁵ Center for Empirical Research in Economics and Behavioral Sciences (CEREB), University of Erfurt, Germany.
⁶ Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine (BNITM), Hamburg, Germany.
⁷ Department of Banking and Finance, University of Innsbruck, Austria.
⁸ Department of Health Behavior, Gillings School of Global Public Health and Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA.
⁹ Department of Social and Decision Sciences, Carnegie Mellon University, USA.
¹⁰ Faculty of Medicine and Health, The University of Sydney, Australia.
¹¹ Consultant, Behavioral and Cultural Insights Unit, WHO Regional Office for Europe, Copenhagen, Denmark.
¹² Harvard Law School, Harvard University, USA.

Abstract

Background: COVID-19 booster vaccine uptake rates are behind the rate of primary vaccination in many countries. Governments and non-governmental institutions rely on a range of interventions aiming to increase booster uptake. Yet, little is known how experts and the general public evaluate these interventions.

Methods: We applied a novel crowdsourcing approach to provide rapid insights on the most promising interventions to promote uptake of COVID-19 booster vaccines. In the first phase (December 2021), international experts (n = 78 from 17 countries) proposed 46 unique interventions. To reduce noise and potential bias, in the second phase (January 2022), experts (n = 307 from 34 countries) and representative general population samples from the UK (n = 299) and the US (n = 300) rated the proposed interventions on several evaluation criteria, including effectiveness and acceptability, on a 5-point Likert-type scale.

Findings: Sanctions were evaluated as potentially most effective but least accepted. Evaluations by expert and general population samples were considerably aligned. Interventions that received the most positive evaluations regarding both effectiveness and acceptability across evaluation groups were: a day off work after getting vaccinated, financial incentives, tax benefits, promotional campaigns, and mobile vaccination teams.

Interpretation: The results provide useful insights to help governmental and non-governmental institutions in their decisions about which interventions to implement. Additionally, the applied crowdsourcing method may be used in future studies to retrieve rapid insights on the comparative evaluation of (health) policies.

Funding: This study received funding from the Austrian Science Fund (SFB F63) and the University of Vienna.

Keywords: Behavioral interventions; Booster vaccination; COVID-19; Crowdsourcing.

Grants and funding

001/WHO_/World Health Organization/International