How to convince vaccine skeptics -- and how not to

I have a personal interest in this because I had a bad case of measles as a child, which may have contributed to severe myopia (near-sightedness), which has caused a detached retina and macular degeneration.

Public Release: 3-Aug-2015
How to convince vaccine skeptics -- and how not to
UCLA and University of Illinois psychologists find a way to change minds
University of California - Los Angeles

Many people who are skeptical about vaccinating their children can be convinced to do so, but only if the argument is presented in a certain way, a team of psychologists from UCLA and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign reported today. The research appears in the online early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The finding is especially important because the number of measles cases in the U.S. tripled from 2013 to 2014. The disease's re-emergence has been linked to a trend of parents refusing to vaccinate their children.

What doesn't change their minds? Telling parents their fear of vaccinations is uninformed and erroneous.

What does? Reminding parents that measles is a terrible disease and that they can protect their children by vaccinating them.

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"It's more effective to accentuate the positive reasons to vaccinate and take a nonconfrontational approach -- 'Here are reasons to get vaccinated' -- than directly trying to counter the negative arguments against vaccines," said Keith Holyoak, UCLA Distinguished Professor of Psychology and a senior author of the study. "There was a reason we all got vaccinated: Measles makes you very sick. That gets forgotten in the polarizing debate on whether the vaccine has side effects."

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Supporters and opponents of vaccines can find common ground, the researchers said.

"People who are skeptical about vaccines are concerned about the safety of their children," said Derek Powell, a UCLA graduate student in psychology and co-lead author of the study. "They want their kids to be healthy. That's also what doctors want. Instead of fighting their misconception, remind them why the vaccine is the best way to keep their kids safe."

People tend to become more entrenched when you challenge their beliefs, Powell said.

The study has broader implications for persuading skeptics on a wide range of issues. Fighting a misconception head-on is not an effective way to change someone's mind, said Holyoak, who conducts research on learning, reasoning, knowledge and creativity.

"Try not to be directly confrontational," Holyoak said. "Try to find common ground, where possible, and build on that."

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http://www.researchgate.net/publication/10131819_The_relationship_between_measles_and_myopia

The relationship between measles and myopia.

"For example, the occurrence of febrile diseases during childhood has been suggested to lead to eye growth that manifests itself as myopia many years later (Curtin, 1985). Hirsch (1957) has specifically reported that individuals experiencing the febrile childhood disease measles between the ages of 5-8 yr were five times more likely to show myopia between the ages of 13-17 yr than those free of childhood measles. Similarly, myopia in some children has been reported to be manifest shortly after such febrile illness as whooping cough (Duke-Elder, 1949). "



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