A taxonomy of reasoning flaws in the anti-vaccine movement

doi:10.1016/j.vaccine.2007.01.046

Vaccine

Volume 25, Issue 16, 20 April 2007, Pages 3146-3152

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.vaccine.2007.01.046 Get rights and content

Abstract

In a scholarly analysis of widely held misconceptions, Gilovich provides a classification scheme of common flaws in reasoning seen in contemporary society. He broadly categorizes these flaws as having cognitive determinants or in having motivational and social determinants. In this survey, the authors examine the various claims against routine childhood and adult vaccines as made by the more public and more organized entities of the anti-vaccine movement as well as those made apparent by surveys of parents and other groups of individuals. The claims illustrate the breadth of reasoning flaws while providing a basis for anticipating and correcting them.

Section snippets

Methods

We surveyed the literature through Medline and EMBASE for surveys in the English language identifying the more common parental and public misconceptions regarding routine vaccination. Using Medline 1966 to October Week 2, 2006, with an intersection of citations found for the keywords of “Parents” and “Vaccination” and the union of the set of citations from keywords “Risk Assessment” or “Perception” or “Culture” or “Attitude to Health,” we found 32 original investigations that identified

Results

The first of the cognitive flaws (Table 1) is one's natural desire to find order and predictability in random data. For example, one observes an apparent change in an occurrence rate of an important event. While the apparent change may be only the result of a random fluctuation or cluster, the observer seeks to impose an order and looks for an explanation.

In the field of vaccines, this flaw is evident in the common misconception that results with the occasional occurrence of sudden infant death

Discussion

These claims of the anti-vaccine movement illustrate the breadth of reasoning flaws. It is the authors’ hope that the identification of these reasoning flaws might better prepare those who would promote and practice routine childhood and adult vaccination.

Gilovich has laid out a framework by which proponents of public health and routine vaccination can better understand the basis for the mistaken beliefs of parents and others who fear and oppose vaccination. By understanding the psychological

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by NIH grants AI 33144, AI 48793 and AI 40065 and Mayo Clinic General Clinical Research Center grant MO1 RR 00585.

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Along the same lines, Genovese (2005) shows that the lowest levels of paranormal belief are found among analytical thinkers and that thinking style contributes, alongside other individual characteristics, in shaping an individual's beliefs. Although little literature investigates this specific association in cases of vaccine hesitancy, with remarkable exceptions (see Anderson, 2016; Schindler et al., 2020; Tomljenovic et al., 2019, 2020), research shows that, under incomplete information, individuals might stumble across heuristic cognitive flaws that support vaccine misconceptions (Jacobson, 2007). Poland et al.’s (2014) review found that heuristics use is associated with automatic processing and greater vaccine skepticism.
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A taxonomy of reasoning flaws in the anti-vaccine movement

Abstract

Section snippets

Methods

Results

Discussion

Acknowledgments

Vaccine

Vaccine

Lancet

Lancet

Vaccine

J Clin Epidemiol

FEMS Immunol Med Microbiol

Vaccine

J Pediatr

The Jeremiah Metzger lecture. Vaccine prophylaxis today: its science, application and politics

Trans Am Clin Climatol Assoc

Health consequences of religious and philosophical exemptions from immunization laws: individual and societal risk of measles

JAMA

Individual and community risks of measles and pertussis associated with personal exemptions to immunization

JAMA

Failure to reach the goal of measles elimination. Apparent paradox of measles infections in immunized persons

Arch Intern Med

Kids first?

Int J Health Serv

How we know what is not so: the fallibility of human reason in everyday life?

French Reference Centers for, S. Sudden unexpected death in infants under 3 months of age and vaccination status—a case–control study

Br J Clin Pharmacol

Safety of combined oligosaccharide conjugate Haemophilus influenzae type b (HbOC) and whole cell diphtheria–tetanus toxoids–pertussis vaccine in infancy. The Kaiser Permanente Pediatric Vaccine Study Group

Pediatr Infect Dis J

Factors associated with refusal of childhood vaccines among parents of school-aged children: a case–control study

Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med