Social Media Health Misinformation and Vaccine Hesitancy Among Young Adults: A Systematic Review of Observational Evidence
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.66687/JMRISKeywords:
Vaccine Hesitancy, Social Media, Health MisinformationAbstract
Background: Social media became a major source of health information during the COVID-19 pandemic while simultaneously enabling rapid dissemination of inaccurate or misleading vaccine claims. Young adults may be particularly exposed because social platforms occupy a prominent role in their information environments.
Methods: This systematic review synthesized high-quality evidence available through 31 December 2022 concerning the relationship between social-media health misinformation and vaccine hesitancy, with particular emphasis on young adults and university-age populations. Peer-reviewed evidence from Q1 journals was examined across observational surveys, social-media analyses, ecological studies, and systematic reviews.
Results: The evidence consistently showed that belief in vaccine misinformation, reliance on less-regulated social-media sources, conspiracy beliefs, and institutional distrust were associated with reduced vaccine confidence or uptake. In one vulnerable adult population, each additional COVID-19 conspiracy theory endorsed was associated with 51% greater odds of vaccine hesitancy. Population-level analyses found that higher online misinformation was associated with lower vaccination uptake even after adjustment for political, demographic, and socioeconomic factors.
Conclusion: Social-media content studies demonstrated that safety concerns, efficacy doubts, conspiracy narratives, and material imitating scientific or journalistic presentation were prominent features of antivaccine misinformation. However, direct observational evidence restricted exclusively to young adults remained comparatively limited, and social-media use alone was an imprecise proxy for misinformation exposure. The evidence supports a credible relationship between misinformation belief and vaccine hesitancy, but future research should distinguish exposure, engagement, belief, and behavioral uptake using longitudinal designs.
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