IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/hepoli/v155y2025ics0168851025000570.html

Framing the loss: Preferences for vaccine hesitancy and gender effect in France and Italy

Author

Listed:
  • Rinaldi, Anna
  • Dellino, Pierfrancesco
  • Paradiso, Massimo

Abstract

Utilizing data from a randomized controlled trial conducted in France and Italy, we propose a seven-category classification system for vaccine behaviors to better investigate the instability of individual preferences in response to two different information framings of the adverse event of vaccine-related death in different languages—one more scientific and abstract, and the other more anecdotal and concrete. We find that loss-framed messages increase vaccine hesitancy in both France and Italy, with abstract framing contributing to a greater extent than concrete framing. The results also highlight significant gender effects. Contrary to previous studies, women exhibit less hesitancy than men. Furthermore, gender differences in reactions to the framing of the loss are revealed: reading the concrete framing, men become less willing to be vaccinated, whereas women become more hesitant with the abstract framing. To enhance vaccine acceptance, effective communication should consider how different loss-framed messages impact vaccine decision-making differently based on gender.

Suggested Citation

  • Rinaldi, Anna & Dellino, Pierfrancesco & Paradiso, Massimo, 2025. "Framing the loss: Preferences for vaccine hesitancy and gender effect in France and Italy," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 155(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:hepoli:v:155:y:2025:i:c:s0168851025000570
    DOI: 10.1016/j.healthpol.2025.105301
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168851025000570
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.healthpol.2025.105301?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Vincenzo Carrieri & Raffele Lagravinese & Giuliano Resce, 2021. "Predicting vaccine hesitancy from area‐level indicators: A machine learning approach," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(12), pages 3248-3256, December.
    2. Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky, 2013. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 6, pages 99-127, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    3. Christine R. Harris & Michael Jenkins & Dale Glaser, 2006. "Gender differences in risk assessment: Why do women take fewer risks than men?," Judgment and Decision Making, Society for Judgment and Decision Making, vol. 1, pages 48-63, July.
    4. Marco Bertoni & Luca Corazzini & Silvana Robone, 2020. "The Good Outcome of Bad News," American Journal of Health Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 6(3), pages 372-409.
    5. Cornelia Betsch & Niels Haase & Frank Renkewitz & Philipp Schmid, 2015. "The narrative bias revisited: What drives the biasing influence of narrative information on risk perceptions?," Judgment and Decision Making, Society for Judgment and Decision Making, vol. 10(3), pages 241-264, May.
    6. Claudio Deiana & Andrea Geraci & Gianluca Mazzarella & Fabio Sabatini, 2022. "Perceived risk and vaccine hesitancy: Quasi‐experimental evidence from Italy," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 31(6), pages 1266-1275, June.
    7. de Ridder, Denise & Adriaanse, Marieke & van Gestel, Laurens & Wachner, Jonas, 2023. "How does nudging the COVID-19 vaccine play out in people who are in doubt about vaccination?," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    8. Betsch, Cornelia & Haase, Niels & Renkewitz, Frank & Schmid, Philipp, 2015. "The narrative bias revisited: What drives the biasing influence of narrative information on risk perceptions?," Judgment and Decision Making, Cambridge University Press, vol. 10(3), pages 241-264, May.
    9. Charness, Gary & Gneezy, Uri, 2012. "Strong Evidence for Gender Differences in Risk Taking," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 83(1), pages 50-58.
    10. Harris, Christine R. & Jenkins, Michael, 2006. "Gender Differences in Risk Assessment: Why do Women Take Fewer Risks than Men?," Judgment and Decision Making, Cambridge University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 48-63, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Beatty, Timothy K.M. & Katare, Bhagyashree, 2018. "Low-cost approaches to increasing gym attendance," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 63-76.
    2. Antonini, Marcello & Genie, Mesfin G. & Attwell, Katie & Attema, Arthur E. & Ward, Jeremy K. & Melegaro, Alessia & Torbica, Aleksandra & Kelly, Brian & Berardi, Chiara & Sequeira, Ana Rita & McGregor,, 2025. "Are we ready for the next pandemic? Public preferences and trade-offs between vaccine characteristics and societal restrictions across 21 countries," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 366(C).
    3. Laine, Tei & Silander, Tomi & Sakamoto, Kayo, 2020. "What distinguishes people who turn into tax evaders when properly incentivized from those who don’t? An experimental study using hypothetical scenarios," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    4. Catalina Amuedo‐Dorantes & Chunbei Wang, 2025. "Intermarriage amid immigration status uncertainty: Evidence from DACA," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 44(4), pages 1317-1346, September.
    5. Michele Ferrara & Anna Bottasso & Daniela Tempesta & Marika Carrieri & Luigi De Gennaro & Giovanni Ponti, 2015. "Gender Differences in Sleep Deprivation Effects on Risk and Inequality Aversion: Evidence from an Economic Experiment," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(3), pages 1-15, March.
    6. Lorenzo Ductor & Sanjeev Goyal & Anja Prummer, 2018. "Gender & Collaboration," Working Papers 856, Queen Mary University of London, School of Economics and Finance.
    7. Schmidt, Ulrich & Friedl, Andreas & Lima de Miranda, Katharina, 2015. "Social comparison and gender differences in risk taking," Kiel Working Papers 2011, Kiel Institute for the World Economy.
    8. Johannes G. Jaspersen & Marc A. Ragin & Justin R. Sydnor, 2020. "Linking subjective and incentivized risk attitudes: The importance of losses," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 60(2), pages 187-206, April.
    9. Laura Hueber & Rene Schwaiger, 2021. "Debiasing Through Experience Sampling: The Case of Myopic Loss Aversion," Working Papers 2021-01, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck.
    10. Peter M. Wiedemann & Holger Schuetz & Franziska Boerner & Martin Clauberg & Rodney Croft & Rajesh Shukla & Toshiko Kikkawa & Ray Kemp & Jan M. Gutteling & Barney de Villiers & Flavia N. da Silva Medei, 2013. "When Precaution Creates Misunderstandings: The Unintended Effects of Precautionary Information on Perceived Risks, the EMF Case," Risk Analysis, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 33(10), pages 1788-1801, October.
    11. Hiromasa Takahashi & Junyi Shen & Kazuhito Ogawa, 2020. "Gender-specific reference-dependent preferences in the experimental trust game," Evolutionary and Institutional Economics Review, Springer, vol. 17(1), pages 25-38, January.
    12. Claya, Pablo Mac & Accursia, Federico M. & Harmath, Pedro, 2022. "Surviving as an Argentine Farmer: Factors that Influence Risk Management Strategies," International Journal on Food System Dynamics, International Center for Management, Communication, and Research, vol. 13(04), December.
    13. Vennis Hong & Sage K Iwamoto & Rei Goto & Sean Young & Sukhawadee Chomduangthip & Natirath Weeranakin & Akihiro Nishi, 2020. "Socio-demographic determinants of motorcycle speeding in Maha Sarakham, Thailand," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(12), pages 1-11, December.
    14. Frijters, Paul & Krekel, Christian & Ulker, Aydogan, 2023. "Should bads be inflicted all at once, like Machiavelli said? Evidence from life-satisfaction data," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 205(C), pages 1-27.
    15. Sheremenko, Ganna & Magnan, Nicholas, 2015. "Gender-specific Risk Preferences and Fertilizer Use in Kenyan Farming Households," 2015 AAEA & WAEA Joint Annual Meeting, July 26-28, San Francisco, California 205766, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    16. Divya Aggarwal & Pitabas Mohanty, 2022. "Influence of imprecise information on risk and ambiguity preferences: Experimental evidence," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 43(4), pages 1025-1038, June.
    17. John R. Nofsinger & Corey A. Shank, 2019. "DEEP sleep: The impact of sleep on financial risk taking," Review of Financial Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 37(1), pages 92-105, January.
    18. Caferra, Rocco & Morone, Andrea & Pierno, Donato, 2024. "From Measurements to Measures: Learning Risk Preferences under Different Risk Elicitation Methods," MPRA Paper 121590, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. repec:osf:thesis:6gptv_v1 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Sabina Źróbek & Elżbieta Zysk & Mirosław Bełej & Natalija Lepkova, 2020. "Do Women Affect the Final Decision on the Housing Market? A Case Study," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(11), pages 1-23, June.
    21. Pedro Albarrán & Judit Alonso & Carmen Herrero & Giovanni Ponti & Marcello Sartarelli & Diletta Topazio, 2025. "An experiment on outcome uncertainty," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 70(2), pages 147-170, April.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:hepoli:v:155:y:2025:i:c:s0168851025000570. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu or the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/healthpol .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.