TY - JOUR
T1 - Public sector's misinformation debunking during the public health campaign
T2 - A case of Hong Kong
AU - Zhu, Rui
AU - Zhang, Xinzhi
N1 - Funding Information:
This work is supported by the General Research Fund (GRF) from the Research Grants Council (RGC) of the Hong Kong SAR (no. 12602420), and the funding of the Department of Journalism, Hong Kong Baptist University.
© The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press.
PY - 2023/6
Y1 - 2023/6
N2 - For a public health campaign to succeed, the public sector is expected to debunk the misinformation transparently and vividly and guide the citizens. The present study focuses on COVID-19 vaccine misinformation in Hong Kong, a non-Western society with a developed economy and sufficient vaccine supply but high vaccine hesitancy. Inspired by the Health Belief Model (HBM) and research on source transparency and the use of visuals in the debunking, the present study examines the COVID-19 vaccine misinformation debunking messages published by the official social media and online channels of the public sector of Hong Kong (n = 126) over 18 months (1 November 2020 to 20 April 2022) during the COVID-19 vaccination campaign. Results showed that the most frequently occurring misinformation themes were misleading claims about the risks and side effects of vaccination, followed by (non-)effectiveness of the vaccines and the (un)-necessity of vaccination. Among the HBM constructs, barriers and benefits of vaccination were mentioned the most, while self-efficacy was the least addressed. Compared with the early stage of the vaccination campaign, an increasing number of posts contained susceptibility, severity or cues to action. Most debunking statements did not disclose any external sources. The public sector actively used illustrations, with affective illustrations outnumbering cognitive ones. Suggestions for improving the quality of misinformation debunking during public health campaigns are discussed.
AB - For a public health campaign to succeed, the public sector is expected to debunk the misinformation transparently and vividly and guide the citizens. The present study focuses on COVID-19 vaccine misinformation in Hong Kong, a non-Western society with a developed economy and sufficient vaccine supply but high vaccine hesitancy. Inspired by the Health Belief Model (HBM) and research on source transparency and the use of visuals in the debunking, the present study examines the COVID-19 vaccine misinformation debunking messages published by the official social media and online channels of the public sector of Hong Kong (n = 126) over 18 months (1 November 2020 to 20 April 2022) during the COVID-19 vaccination campaign. Results showed that the most frequently occurring misinformation themes were misleading claims about the risks and side effects of vaccination, followed by (non-)effectiveness of the vaccines and the (un)-necessity of vaccination. Among the HBM constructs, barriers and benefits of vaccination were mentioned the most, while self-efficacy was the least addressed. Compared with the early stage of the vaccination campaign, an increasing number of posts contained susceptibility, severity or cues to action. Most debunking statements did not disclose any external sources. The public sector actively used illustrations, with affective illustrations outnumbering cognitive ones. Suggestions for improving the quality of misinformation debunking during public health campaigns are discussed.
KW - COVID-19 misinformation intervention
KW - debunking
KW - health belief model
KW - public sector
KW - visual elements
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85161103714&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1093/heapro/daad053
DO - 10.1093/heapro/daad053
M3 - Journal article
C2 - 37279470
AN - SCOPUS:85161103714
SN - 0957-4824
VL - 38
JO - Health Promotion International
JF - Health Promotion International
IS - 3
M1 - daad053
ER -