Developing a practical tool for measuring parental vaccine hesitancy: A people-centered validation approach in Dutch
Vaccine hesitancy (VH) about routine childhood vaccinations drives falling vaccine uptake rates. This is a major public health challenge and therefore important to monitor uniformly. The challenge is that different methods are used to measure VH and that, in non-English language, there may not be an...
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| Format: | Article |
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Taylor & Francis Group
2025-12-01
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| Series: | Human Vaccines & Immunotherapeutics |
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| Online Access: | https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/10.1080/21645515.2025.2466303 |
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| author | Daphne Bussink-Voorend Jeannine L. A. Hautvast Tim Wiersma Reinier Akkermans Marlies E. J. L. Hulscher |
| author_facet | Daphne Bussink-Voorend Jeannine L. A. Hautvast Tim Wiersma Reinier Akkermans Marlies E. J. L. Hulscher |
| author_sort | Daphne Bussink-Voorend |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Vaccine hesitancy (VH) about routine childhood vaccinations drives falling vaccine uptake rates. This is a major public health challenge and therefore important to monitor uniformly. The challenge is that different methods are used to measure VH and that, in non-English language, there may not be an unequivocal translation of VH terminology. We aimed to develop and validate a method to assess VH in a simple and self-reported manner, with a mixed-methods study using a people-centered approach with a diverse group of parents and illustrated in Dutch. In the quantitative part, parents were asked to rate experienced vaccine hesitancy on a 10-point Likert scale, using five differently worded Dutch translations for VH. We analyzed internal consistency with Cronbach’s alpha and correlation with the short parental attitudes about childhood vaccination (PACV-5) scale. A total of 532 parents participated in the survey. We found that the five worded alternatives measured the same construct, indicated by a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.95. The wording resembling ‘doubt’ showed highest correlation with the PACV-5 score (coefficient −0.525, p < .001). In the qualitative part of this study, we conducted cognitive interviews with 12 lower educated parents to evaluate the comprehensibility and interpretation of the question and VH translations. The findings reinforced and added to the quantitative findings that ‘doubt’ is the preferred wording. Based on the integrated results, we developed the Vaccine Hesitancy Assessment (VHA) tool. We encourage its use for monitoring purposes at the time of decision-making as this may provide a window of opportunity for decision-support interventions. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-6e9960d3d20243bb8375f66d1fea2314 |
| institution | DOAJ |
| issn | 2164-5515 2164-554X |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-12-01 |
| publisher | Taylor & Francis Group |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Human Vaccines & Immunotherapeutics |
| spelling | doaj-art-6e9960d3d20243bb8375f66d1fea23142025-08-20T03:05:22ZengTaylor & Francis GroupHuman Vaccines & Immunotherapeutics2164-55152164-554X2025-12-0121110.1080/21645515.2025.2466303Developing a practical tool for measuring parental vaccine hesitancy: A people-centered validation approach in DutchDaphne Bussink-Voorend0Jeannine L. A. Hautvast1Tim Wiersma2Reinier Akkermans3Marlies E. J. L. Hulscher4Radboud Institute for Health Sciences, Primary and Community Care, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The NetherlandsRadboud Institute for Health Sciences, Primary and Community Care, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The NetherlandsRadboud Institute for Health Sciences, Primary and Community Care, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The NetherlandsIQ Health Science Department, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The NetherlandsIQ Health Science Department, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The NetherlandsVaccine hesitancy (VH) about routine childhood vaccinations drives falling vaccine uptake rates. This is a major public health challenge and therefore important to monitor uniformly. The challenge is that different methods are used to measure VH and that, in non-English language, there may not be an unequivocal translation of VH terminology. We aimed to develop and validate a method to assess VH in a simple and self-reported manner, with a mixed-methods study using a people-centered approach with a diverse group of parents and illustrated in Dutch. In the quantitative part, parents were asked to rate experienced vaccine hesitancy on a 10-point Likert scale, using five differently worded Dutch translations for VH. We analyzed internal consistency with Cronbach’s alpha and correlation with the short parental attitudes about childhood vaccination (PACV-5) scale. A total of 532 parents participated in the survey. We found that the five worded alternatives measured the same construct, indicated by a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.95. The wording resembling ‘doubt’ showed highest correlation with the PACV-5 score (coefficient −0.525, p < .001). In the qualitative part of this study, we conducted cognitive interviews with 12 lower educated parents to evaluate the comprehensibility and interpretation of the question and VH translations. The findings reinforced and added to the quantitative findings that ‘doubt’ is the preferred wording. Based on the integrated results, we developed the Vaccine Hesitancy Assessment (VHA) tool. We encourage its use for monitoring purposes at the time of decision-making as this may provide a window of opportunity for decision-support interventions.https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/10.1080/21645515.2025.2466303Vaccine hesitancyroutine childhood vaccinationmixed-methodsvalidationmeasurementdecision-making |
| spellingShingle | Daphne Bussink-Voorend Jeannine L. A. Hautvast Tim Wiersma Reinier Akkermans Marlies E. J. L. Hulscher Developing a practical tool for measuring parental vaccine hesitancy: A people-centered validation approach in Dutch Human Vaccines & Immunotherapeutics Vaccine hesitancy routine childhood vaccination mixed-methods validation measurement decision-making |
| title | Developing a practical tool for measuring parental vaccine hesitancy: A people-centered validation approach in Dutch |
| title_full | Developing a practical tool for measuring parental vaccine hesitancy: A people-centered validation approach in Dutch |
| title_fullStr | Developing a practical tool for measuring parental vaccine hesitancy: A people-centered validation approach in Dutch |
| title_full_unstemmed | Developing a practical tool for measuring parental vaccine hesitancy: A people-centered validation approach in Dutch |
| title_short | Developing a practical tool for measuring parental vaccine hesitancy: A people-centered validation approach in Dutch |
| title_sort | developing a practical tool for measuring parental vaccine hesitancy a people centered validation approach in dutch |
| topic | Vaccine hesitancy routine childhood vaccination mixed-methods validation measurement decision-making |
| url | https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/10.1080/21645515.2025.2466303 |
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