The Role of the Audience In Developing a Vaccine Communications Campaign

Background: Through quantitative and qualitative data collection, CDC has learned that parents have a spectrum of knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs, and therefore, a spectrum of information needs when it comes to vaccines.  According to the 2011 ConsumerStyles survey, about 41% of parents of children 6 years of age and younger had no vaccines concerns.  However, some parents had concerns about the number of shots given at a single doctor’s visit (22%), children getting too many shots in the first couple of years of life (21%), autism (20%), and the pain associated with the shots (18%).  While national surveillance has found less than 1% of infants nationally are completely unvaccinated, for some parents, their concerns may cause them to choose to not fully vaccinate their children against serious and sometimes deadly vaccine-preventable diseases.  To most effectively communicate with parents about vaccines and vaccine safety, it is imperative to understand their perspectives, information needs, and preferred terminology. 

Program background:  Understanding how parents think about and approach vaccines for their children is critical for designing effective communication to maintain high immunization rates.  CDC designed a mixed methods research plan to assist in the development of a multi-faceted communications campaign to help parents understand the value and benefit of vaccines, the potential seriousness of vaccine-preventable diseases, and empower parents to choose vaccination. 

Evaluation Methods and Results:  CDC has undertaken a series of research projects to gain an understanding of parental knowledge, attitudes and beliefs related to infant/childhood immunizations, as well as how to clearly communicate complicated vaccine information to parents.  These research endeavors included nationally representative surveys and focus groups comprised of African American, Caucasian, and Latino/Hispanic parents to explore knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs about infant immunization and test messages and communication materials.  Because research indicated that health care professionals are parents’ most trusted source of health information, CDC conducted in-depth interviews with pediatricians.  Mall intercept surveys with parents were used to refine campaign materials. CDC also conducted web usability testing of a new parent-friendly vaccine website. 

Conclusions: Research findings indicated that many parents did not know a lot about vaccine-preventable diseases, and therefore, did not understand the seriousness of the symptoms associated with the diseases.  Some parents were interested in detailed information about these diseases, while others wanted a basic understanding.  Several healthcare professionals also said that they felt that different parents needed different levels of information.   These insights led to the development of a series of fact sheets focusing on vaccine-preventable diseases. Through web usability testing, we also learned that parents have different information needs.  Therefore, we used a “bite, snack, meal” approach to layer and tailor information on a new parent-friendly vaccine website.  Finally, using the images, terms, and messages that parents identified as being most clear and salient to them, CDC developed a mass media campaign that includes print ads and television and radio public service announcements. 

Implications for research and/or practice:  CDC hopes that providing parents with clear vaccine messages will help maintain high immunization rates across the United States.