Role of Parents’ Perceived Risk and Responsibility in Deciding on Children’s COVID-19 Vaccination

Abstract

We examined associations between parents' reports for whether their children had been vaccinated against coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and parents' perceptions of the vaccine's long-term risk, as well as their own sense of responsibility on deciding to vaccinate or not vaccinate their children. During the period when the Omicron variant was dominant (February-March 2022), we surveyed parents from a nationally representative, probability-based Internet panel about vaccination of their school-aged children, perceptions that the vaccine's long-term risk exceeds risks without vaccination (henceforth: comparative long-term risk), their tendency to feel more responsible if their child became sick from vaccination than when unvaccinated (henceforth: anticipated responsibility), and their own vaccination status. We used multivariate analyses to assess associations of children's COVID-19 vaccination with parental comparative long-term risk perceptions, anticipated responsibility, parents' vaccination status, and demographics. Among 1715 parent respondents (71% of eligible), 45% perceived vaccine-related comparative long-term risk and 18% perceived greater anticipated responsibility from vaccination than no vaccination. After accounting for parental vaccination, parents who were more concerned about comparative long-term risk and who reported greater anticipated responsibility were 6% (95% confidence interval, -0.09 to -0.03; P < .001) and 15% (95% confidence interval, -0.19 to -0.11; P < .001) less likely to have vaccinated their children, respectively. Findings were driven by vaccinated parents. Parents' perceptions of the COVID-19 vaccine's long-term comparative risk and their greater anticipated responsibility for children getting sick if vaccinated (versus not) were associated with lower vaccine uptake among children of vaccinated parents.