Correction: Twitter and Facebook posts about COVID-19 are less likely to spread misinformation compared to other health topics.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.

Understanding the psychological antecedents of COVID-19 vaccine acceptance among Black Americans: implications for vaccine communication.

Background: Guided by the 5C (confidence, complacency, constraints, calculation, and collective responsibility) model of vaccination behavior, we examine the psychological antecedents of COVID-19 vaccine acceptance (i.e. attitudes and intentions toward COVID-19 vaccination) among Black Americans, a group disproportionately affected by the coronavirus pandemic.

Beliefs in COVID-19 Vaccine Misinformation Among Unvaccinated Black Americans: Prevalence, Socio-Psychological Predictors, and Consequences.

Health-related misinformation is a major threat to public health and particularly worrisome for populations experiencing health disparities. This study sets out to examine the prevalence, socio-psychological predictors, and consequences of beliefs in COVID-19 vaccine misinformation among unvaccinated Black Americans. We conducted an online national survey with Black Americans who had not been vaccinated against COVID-19 ( = 800) between February and March 2021.

Twitter and Facebook posts about COVID-19 are less likely to spread misinformation compared to other health topics.

The COVID-19 pandemic brought widespread attention to an "infodemic" of potential health misinformation. This claim has not been assessed based on evidence. We evaluated if health misinformation became more common during the pandemic.

General and health-related social media use among adults with children in the household: Findings from a national survey in the United States.

Objective: Examine predictors of social media use among a nationally representative sample of adults with children in the household.

Methods: Data were collected from the Health Information National Trends (HINTS) Survey from 2017 to 2020 (N = 3559). Multivariate logistic regression models assessed the association between sociodemographic variables and social networking site (SNS) use, SNS use to share health information, participation in online forum or support groups for health issues and watching health-related videos on YouTube.

Willingness of Black and White Adults to Accept Vaccines in Development: An Exploratory Study Using National Survey Data.

Purpose: Explore acceptability of vaccines in development: cancer, Type II diabetes, Alzheimer's disease, Lyme disease, Ebola, and obesity. Research questions: To what extent does acceptability vary by vaccine type? To what extent does acceptability of vaccines in development vary by race and other key demographics? To what extent are general vaccine hesitancy and key demographics associated with acceptability of vaccines in development?

Design: Cross-sectional online survey administered through GfK's KnowledgePanel in 2015. Analysis completed in 2020.

The public's role in COVID-19 vaccination: Human-centered recommendations to enhance pandemic vaccine awareness, access, and acceptance in the United States.

Given the social and economic upheavals caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, political leaders, health officials, and members of the public are eager for solutions. One of the most promising, if they can be successfully developed, is vaccines. While the technological development of such countermeasures is currently underway, a key social gap remains.

Will the public take a universal influenza vaccine?: the need for social and behavioral science research.

Every influenza season, uptake of the flu vaccine falls short of the Healthy People 2020 goal of at least 70% of adults being vaccinated. Mixed methods research finds multiple factors associated with this phenomenon including misconceptions about the vaccine, skepticism about an annual vaccine, concerns about efficacy and safety, lack of knowledge, perceived risk, among others. The national goal to develop, test and produce an effective universal influenza vaccine requires a significant scientific and financial investment in research.

Using classification and regression tree analysis to explore parental influenza vaccine decisions.

Background And Objectives: Influenza poses a public health threat for children and adults. The CDC recommends annual influenza vaccination for children <18 years, yet vaccine uptake remains low for children (57.9%) and adults (37.

Vaccine-related advertising in the Facebook Ad Archive.

Background: In 2018, Facebook introduced Ad Archive as a platform to improve transparency in advertisements related to politics and "issues of national importance." Vaccine-related Facebook advertising is publicly available for the first time. After measles outbreaks in the US brought renewed attention to the possible role of Facebook advertising in the spread of vaccine-related misinformation, Facebook announced steps to limit vaccine-related misinformation.

Measles outbreaks and public attitudes towards vaccine exemptions: some cautions and strategies for addressing vaccine hesitancy.

Today, the United States and countries throughout the world are experiencing measles outbreaks that have sickened thousands of children. From the Disneyland outbreak in 2014 to today, some states have responded with changes in laws on vaccine requirements and exemptions. In this article, we examine the history of vaccine laws, and using our 2015 survey data, explore to what extent the news coverage of the Disneyland outbreak altered parents' attitudes toward required vaccination and non-medical exemptions.

Home remedy use and influenza vaccination among African American and white adults: An exploratory study.

Racial disparities in influenza vaccination persist between African American and White adults. It is critical to explore the reasons behind this disparity, which may be linked to the use of "folk" or home remedies for illness prevention and treatment. For this study, The GfK Group was contracted to conduct a nationally-representative survey (n = 819 African American and 838 White respondents).

Characterizing Trends in Human Papillomavirus Vaccine Discourse on Reddit (2007-2015): An Observational Study.

Background: Despite the introduction of the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination as a preventive measure in 2006 for cervical and other cancers, uptake rates remain suboptimal, resulting in preventable cancer mortality. Social media, widely used for information seeking, can influence users' knowledge and attitudes regarding HPV vaccination. Little is known regarding attitudes related to HPV vaccination on Reddit (a popular news aggregation site and online community), particularly related to cancer risk and sexual activity.

Malicious Actors on Twitter: A Guide for Public Health Researchers.

Social bots and other malicious actors have a significant presence on Twitter. It is increasingly clear that some of their activities can have a negative impact on public health. This guide provides an overview of the types of malicious actors currently active on Twitter by highlighting the characteristic behaviors and strategies employed.

Measuring vaccine hesitancy, confidence, trust and flu vaccine uptake: Results of a national survey of White and African American adults.

Introduction: Vaccine hesitancy (VH) has emerged as a factor in vaccine delay and refusal yet the measurement of the constructs within vaccine hesitancy remains a challenge. Outstanding questions include; should VH be measured as an attitude or a behavior? What is the role of key constructs including confidence, complacency, and convenience? What is the role of trust? Should measures be general or vaccine specific? Furthermore, much of the research has centered on parental acceptance of vaccines for their children.

Methods: In March of 2015, we contracted with the GfK Group to conduct a nationally representative survey with 819 African American and 838 White, US born adults.

Can online self-reports assist in real-time identification of influenza vaccination uptake? A cross-sectional study of influenza vaccine-related tweets in the USA, 2013-2017.

Introduction: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) spend significant time and resources to track influenza vaccination coverage each influenza season using national surveys. Emerging data from social media provide an alternative solution to surveillance at both national and local levels of influenza vaccination coverage in near real time.

Objectives: This study aimed to characterise and analyse the vaccinated population from temporal, demographical and geographical perspectives using automatic classification of vaccination-related Twitter data.

"You don't trust a government vaccine": Narratives of institutional trust and influenza vaccination among African American and white adults.

Vaccine confidence depends on trust in vaccines as products and trust in the system that produces them. In the US, this system consists of a complex network connecting pharmaceutical companies, government agencies, and the healthcare system. We explore narratives from White and African American adults describing their trust in these institutions, with a focus on influenza vaccine.

Discordance Between Human Papillomavirus Twitter Images and Disparities in Human Papillomavirus Risk and Disease in the United States: Mixed-Methods Analysis.

Background: Racial and ethnic minorities are disproportionately affected by human papillomavirus (HPV)-related cancer, many of which could have been prevented with vaccination. Yet, the initiation and completion rates of HPV vaccination remain low among these populations. Given the importance of social media platforms for health communication, we examined US-based HPV images on Twitter.

Breaking down the monolith: Understanding flu vaccine uptake among African Americans.

Black adults are significantly less likely to be immunized for seasonal influenza when compared to Whites. This persistent disparity contributes to increased influenza-related morbidity and mortality in the African American population. Most scholarship on vaccine disparities has compared Whites and Blacks.

The Influence of Race and Ethnicity on Becoming a Human Subject: Factors Associated with Participation in Research.

Inroduction: The purpose of this study was to explore factors associated with willingness of African Americans and Latinos to participate in biomedical and public health research and to delineate factors that influences the decision to become a human subject.

Methods: We present results from a 2010 random digit-dial telephone survey of 2,455 African American (N= 1,191) and Latino (N= 1,264) adults. We used standard measures to assess knowledge of research, terminology, informed consent procedures, previous participation in research, health care experiences, social support, risk perception, religiousness, and trust.

The influence of social norms on flu vaccination among African American and White adults.

Adult influenza vaccination rates remain suboptimal, particularly among African Americans. Social norms may influence vaccination behavior, but little research has focused on influenza vaccine and almost no research has focused on racially-specific norms. This mixed methods investigation utilizes qualitative interviews and focus groups (n = 118) and national survey results (n = 1643) to assess both descriptive and subjective norms surrounding influenza vaccination.