This study investigated how exposure to negative and misleading online comments about the COVID-19 vaccination persuasive messages and the ensuing corrective rebuttals of these comments affected people’s attitudes and intentions regarding vaccination. An online experiment was performed with 344 adults in the United States. The results showed that rebuttals by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, rather than those by social media users, indirectly increased people’s willingness to receive the vaccine by reducing their psychological reactance to persuasive messages and their belief in the misinformation contained in the comments. Rebuttals by social media users became more effective in reducing reactance when people initially had stronger pro-vaccination attitudes.

本研究调查了暴露于关于 COVID-19 疫苗接种说服信息的负面和误导性在线评论以及随后对这些评论的纠正反驳如何影响人们对疫苗接种的态度和意图。在美国对 344 名成年人进行了在线实验。结果表明，疾病控制和预防中心的反驳，而不是社交媒体用户的反驳，通过减少人们对说服性信息的心理反应以及他们对评论中包含的错误信息的信念，间接提高了人们接种疫苗的意愿。当人们最初对疫苗接种持更强的态度时，社交媒体用户的反驳在减少抵抗力方面变得更加有效。