Keywords
vaccination, COVID-19, nudge, influenza, field experiment
Abstract
Many Americans fail to get life-saving vaccines each year, and the availability of a vaccine for COVID-19 makes the challenge of encouraging vaccination more urgent than ever. We present a large field experiment (N = 47,306) testing 19 nudges delivered to patients via text message and designed to boost adoption of the influenza vaccine. Our findings suggest that text messages sent prior to a primary care visit can boost vaccination rates by an average of 5%. Overall, interventions performed better when they were 1) framed as reminders to get flu shots that were already reserved for the patient and 2) congruent with the sort of communications patients expected to receive from their healthcare provider (i.e., not surprising, casual, or interactive). The best-performing intervention in our study reminded patients twice to get their flu shot at their upcoming doctor’s appointment and indicated it was reserved for them. This successful script could be used as a template for campaigns to encourage the adoption of life-saving vaccines, including against COVID-19.
Original Publication Citation
“A Mega-Study of Text-Based Nudges Encouraging Patients to Get Vaccinated at an Upcoming Doctor’s Appointment.” 2021. PNAS, 118(20) (with Katherine L. Milkman, Mitesh S. Patel, Linnea Gandhi, Heather Graci, Dena Gromet, Quoc Dang Hung Ho, Joseph Kay, Timothy Lee, Modupe Akinola, Joshn Beshears, Jonathan Bogard, Alison Buttenheim, Christopher Chabris, Gretchen B. Chapman, James J. Choi, Hengchen Dai, Craig R. Fox, Amir Goren, Matthew Hilchey, Jilian Hmurovic, Leslie John, Dean Karlan, Melanie Kim, Melanie David I. Laibson, Cait Lamberton, Madrian Page 6 Michelle N. Meyer, Maria Modanu, Jimin Nam, Todd Rogers, Renate Rondina, Silvia Saccardo, Maheen Shermohammed, Dilip Soman, Jehan Sparks, Caleb Warren, Megan Weber, Ron Berman, Chalanda Evans, Christopher Snider, Eli Tsukayama, Christophe Van den Bulte, Kevin Volpp, Kevin and Angela Duckworth). https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2101165118
BYU ScholarsArchive Citation
Milkman, Katherine L.; Patel, Mitesh S.; Gandhi, Linnea; Graci, Heather N.; Gromet, Dena M.; Ho, Hung; and Madrian, Brigitte C., "A Megastudy of Text-based Nudges Encouraging Patients to get Vaccinated at an Upcoming Doctor’s Appointment" (2021). Faculty Publications. 8941.
https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/facpub/8941
Document Type
Peer-Reviewed Article
Publication Date
2021
Publisher
PNAS
Language
English
College
Marriott School of Business
Department
Finance
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