Education and Vaccine Uptake [View all]

[HuckleB]

http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/education-and-vaccine-uptake/

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The study also purports to find that the there was an inverse relationship between education level and vaccine use – college-educated mothers were less likely to vaccinate their children. Further, in the 8 years after the Lancet study this gap increased. This education-gap is also in line with previous research, but needs some explanation. We need to distinguish unvaccinated from undervaccinated, and vaccine non-compliance from vaccine refusal. When looking at the undervaccinated, and specifically those who missed scheduled vaccines, this correlates with lower socioeconomic status and less education. This is in line with a more general pattern – the fewer resources a family has the less likely they are to avail themselves of available health care.

However, if you look at those who refuse or delay vaccines as a deliberate choice, there is a positive correlation with the education level of the parents, especially the mother. This may seem paradoxical at first – higher education leading to bad health care decision making, but actually it makes perfect sense. First, let me say that I am taking as a premise that refusing vaccines is a bad decision. For reference just plug in “vaccine” into the search box on this blog and you can read dozens of articles explaining my position. In short, the evidence overwhelmingly supports the conclusion that vaccines are safe and effective and a net health benefit for the vaccinated. Fears over vaccines causing autism or other neurological damage are based upon soundly refuted pseudoscience. So why, then, the reverse correlation with education?

The typical hypothesis, which is plausible but untested (as far as I know), is that higher education levels leads to greater access to information, specifically on the internet, where vaccine fears have largely been spread. If you are not exposed to misinformation about vaccines then you cannot act on that misinformation.

I also think, however, that this is part of a larger phenomenon – a direct relationship between education level and general acceptance of pseudoscience. Prior surveys have found a correlation between higher levels of education and belief in ghosts, ESP, and alien visitations. Education superficially seems to make us more gullible. However, the interpretation of this result, in light of other psychological research, is different than just gullibility. Access to information is likely part of the reason for the correlation between education and belief. Another factor is likely that as we get smarter we get better at justifying our own beliefs. Having an education can make someone more confident in defending their offbeat beliefs, and better able to defend those beliefs from the skeptics.

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If having an "education" meant that you had learned the scientific process in total, that might be a good thing. But, in this world, it does not mean that. Oddly, "education" sometimes makes people think too much of their own knowledge.

Ugh.