Perceived stress, belief in conspiracy theories and anti-vaccination attitudes in Canadian sample

Abstract

Background: The use of COVID-19 vaccinations to prevent serious illness and infection from the SARS-CoV-2 virus has been accepted by approximately two-thirds of the Canadian population, at the time that this article was completed. Although COVID-19 mRNA vaccines are widely accessible in North America, there remains a substantial portion of Canadians who demonstrate vaccine hesitancy. The objective of this study is to examine whether there exists a predictive relationship between one’s perceived stress-levels, general support for conspiracy theories, and antivaccination attitudes.

Methods: Fifty-one participants from the Vancouver, British Columbia region were recruited through social media. Participants completed a survey, which asked about perceived stress, vaccine hesitancy, and belief in conspiracy theories. Regression models were developed to measure the association between perceived stress and vaccine hesitancy. Simple mediation analysis was conducted to determine if belief in conspiracy theories mediated the relationship between perceived stress and vaccine hesitancy.

Results: Higher levels of conspiratorial thinking were associated with increased vaccine hesitancy (β = -0.465, p < .001, 95% CI [-0.81, -0.21]). Belief in conspiracies was not found to mediate the relationship between perceived stress-levels and vaccination attitudes.

Discussion: The results support a positive correlation between anti-vaccination attitude and the tendency to adopt general conspiracy beliefs. However, no association between vaccination attitudes and perceived stress was found, nor did conspiracy belief mediate the relationship between perceived stress and vaccination attitude. The role scientific uncertainty plays in civilian trust and conspiratorial thinking was explored. Some limitations include the use of a small sample size.