A Shot of Faith—Analyzing Vaccine Hesitancy in Certain Religious Communities in the United States

Vaccine hesitancy in the United States continues to hamper ongoing coronavirus vaccination efforts. One set of populations with higher-than-average initial rates of vaccine hesitancy are certain religious groups, such as white evangelicals, African-American Protestants, and Hispanic Catholics. This article discusses the reasons underlying vaccine hesitancy in these populations, focusing on new trends in religious, political, and ideological beliefs that may influence vaccine acceptance. By using recent data and empirical case studies, this article describes how these trends could hinder the effectiveness of certain vaccine promotion strategies while also improving the potential efficacy of other forms of vaccine promotion, such as faith-based outreach. (100)

Persuading US White evangelicals to vaccinate for COVID-19: Testing message effectiveness in fall 2020 and spring 2021

The development of COVID-19 vaccines was an important breakthrough for ending the pandemic. However, people refusing to get vaccinated diminish the level of community protection afforded to others. In the United States, White evangelicals have proven to be a particularly difficult group to convince to get vaccinated. Here we investigate whether this group can be persuaded to get vaccinated. To do this, we leverage data from two survey experiments, one fielded prior to approval of COVID-19 vaccines (study 1) and one fielded after approval (study 2). In both experiments, respondents were randomly assigned to treatment messages to promote COVID-19 vaccination. In study 1, we find that a message that emphasizes community interest and reciprocity with an invocation of embarrassment for choosing not to vaccinate is the most effective at increasing uptake intentions, while values-consistent messaging appears to be ineffective. In contrast, in study 2 we observe that this message is no longer effective and that most messages produce little change in vaccine intent. This inconsistency may be explained by the characteristics of White evangelicals who remain unvaccinated vis à vis those who got vaccinated. These results demonstrate the importance of retesting messages over time, the apparent limitations of values-targeted messaging, and document the need to consider heterogeneity even within well-defined populations. This work also cautions against drawing broad conclusions from studies carried out at a single point in time during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Does it matter if the President isn't pious? White Evangelicals and elite religiosity in the Trump era

Trump’s unwavering support among White Evangelicals - among whom many believe that Trump was also ordained by God - seems a contradiction considering his seeming irreligiosity and well publicized moral transgressions. To explain this contradiction, I use data from the American Trends Panel (ATP) to test whether White Evangelicals exhibit strong preferences for elite religiosity, and whether they evaluate Trump as being particularly religious. I find that White Evangelicals exhibit strong, generalized preferences for elite religiosity. However, when it comes to specific evaluations of Trump, White Evangelicals appear to be largely indifferent to whether or not Trump is religious. I also find that White Evangelicals who encounter threats to their religious identities are especially likely to believe that Trump was ordained by God to be President. Therefore, one explanation for this seeming indifference is Trump’s ability to speak to White Evangelicals who feel as though their beliefs are becoming marginalized in an increasingly religiously plural America. These findings demonstrate that Trump is a unique case when it comes to the effects of religiosity identity on elite evaluations, and provide a new vantage point for understanding why so many White Evangelicals support Trump despite the fact they are indifferent to his irreligiosity.

Putting US First: How Outgroup Hostilities and Defense of the Status Quo Motivate White Evangelical Affect Toward Candidates in U.S. Elections 2004 to 2016

How do voters construct feelings toward inparty elites? More specifically, how do they do so when they lack a shared policy agenda or shared salient social identity with candidates beyond partisan identification? In this paper, I investigate this puzzle by developing a theory of Putting America First to explain white evangelical affect toward Republican presidential candidates from 2004 to 2016. Using ANES surveys from 2004 to 2016, I test the effectiveness of this model of candidate affect. I find that shared outgroup hostility, what I call Putting Us First, motivates positive affect for presidential candidates among white evangelicals, regardless of shared policy objectives and descriptive representation. Overtime, white evangelicals’ affect is driven by outgroup hostilities rather than Culture Wars values. Overall, this informs our understanding of voter affect toward candidates and the increasingly important role of social outgroup hostility in defense of the status quo.