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Vaccine skeptics actually think differently than other people:
In 2000, the measles virus was declared eliminated from the United States. Despite cases coming in from outside the country, there were few outbreaks because most people were vaccinated against measles. And then 2019 happened.
The U.S. saw 1,282 confirmed cases in 31 states -- the greatest number reported since 1992, with nearly three-fourths linked to recent outbreaks in New York, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Most cases were among people who were not vaccinated against measles.
After events like this, many people express confusion about others' hesitancy or unwillingness to get vaccinated or to vaccinate their children, a concept called vaccine skepticism. As vaccine skepticism has become increasingly widespread, two researchers in the Texas Tech University Department of Psychological Sciences have suggested a possible explanation.
In an article published recently in the journal Vaccine, Mark LaCour and Tyler Davis suggest some people find vaccines risky because they overestimate the likelihood of negative events, particularly those that are rare.
The fact that these overestimations carry over through all kinds of negative events -- not just those related to vaccines -- suggests that people higher in vaccine skepticism actually may process information differently than people lower in vaccine skepticism, said Davis, an associate professor of experimental psychology and director of the Caprock FMRI Laboratory.
"We might have assumed that people who are high in vaccine skepticism would have overestimated the likelihood of negative vaccine-related events, but it is more surprising that this is true for negative, mortality-related events as a broader category," Davis said. "Here we saw an overestimation of rare events for things that don't have anything to do with vaccination. This suggests that there are basic cognitive or affective variables that influence vaccine skepticism."
[...] "Do some people encode scary stories -- for instance, hearing about a child that has a seizure after getting vaccinated -- more strongly than others and then consequently remember these anecdotes more easily?" he asked. "Do they instead have certain attitudes and search their memory harder for evidence to support this belief? Is it a bit of both? How can you counteract these processes?
"I'm excited that we're finding basic, cognitive factors that are linked with vaccine skepticism: It could end up being a way of reaching this diverse group."
Mark LaCour, Tyler Davis. Vaccine skepticism reflects basic cognitive differences in mortality-related event frequency estimation. Vaccine, 2020; DOI: 10.1016/j.vaccine.2020.02.052
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 17 2020, @04:02AM (13 children)
Take a look around you to see the great success of the vaccination strategy.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Immerman on Friday April 17 2020, @04:23AM (2 children)
You mean almost every child surviving to adulthood? It used to be that losing a child to some terrible illness was pretty common.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 17 2020, @04:08PM (1 child)
This is the real issue. I am a gen-Xer, my father is a boomer and lost his brother to a disease. Guess what, i got all my vaccines. But someone from my generation would only have seen chicken pox, i was still a part of the 'lets get them all together so they all get it, close school for a week, and get this over with' mindset for that. But millennials don't even have that. New parents no longer have any past experience to allow them to properly gauge risk of not getting vaccines.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Saturday April 18 2020, @12:55AM
I've been seeing a meme going around - Darwin: "Relax, I've got this."
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday April 17 2020, @04:50AM
You got a better idea? Let's see a proof-of-concept demonstration then.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Kell on Friday April 17 2020, @04:54AM (4 children)
Absolutely. What we're seeing in the world today is the direct effect of lacking a vaccine for a singal illness.
Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Kell on Saturday April 18 2020, @01:24AM (3 children)
Disagree mod, really? We're stuck inside while the economy falters because of a pandemic; if we had a vaccine, we would not be. But you know, failing to recognise factual reality does seem to be a common aspect of anti-vaxxer mentality, so this is on-brand, I guess.
Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Saturday April 18 2020, @01:44AM
Someone disagreed with you because SoylentNews has it's very own anti-vaxx flat earthers.
Weird.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 18 2020, @02:55AM (1 child)
No, we're stuck inside, while the economy falters, because the government has ordered it so, in contrast to every seasonal pandemic that has struck us in living memory.
And if I had a million dollars, I wouldn't have to work. And we're not getting that vaccine any time soon.
(Score: 2) by Kell on Thursday April 23 2020, @11:48PM
Most seasonal pandemics do not cause fatalities on the order of what we are observing. It is the government's job to safeguard its populace - if they allowed people to roam around randomly during a potentially-lethal global pandemic there would be a host of other people (rightly) calling for their heads. He who pleases all pleases none, so just focus on pleasing the guy who is talking sense.
What constitutes "soon" to you when it comes to getting a vaccine? 12-18 months for a fast-tracked vaccine would be pretty phenomenal.
Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Friday April 17 2020, @09:16AM (2 children)
OK, I look around. I don't see a single case of Polio, thanks to Polio vaccination. I don't see a single case of smallpox, thanks to smallpox vaccination. I see many cases of Covid-19, due to lack ofCovid-19 vaccination.
Seems that vaccination is a pretty good strategy, after all.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Saturday April 18 2020, @01:51AM
I work with a guy who contracted polio as a kid, in 1960's Holland, when the vaccine was not always available.
Idiot anti-vaxxers ought to have a discussion with him about the value of vaccinations. He won't go easy I can tell you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 18 2020, @08:15AM
If the pharma companies could be trusted to deliver safe products and not just maximize profits ....
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 17 2020, @02:24PM
You mean the world where people see these diseases as such a small threat that they don't want to risk giving their kid a shot?
I think I heard it put best, "Vaccines are a victim of their own success."