Messaging Matrix Test Messages

Message Matrix: Wave 7 Updated Vaccine and Parents Messages — Proposed Messages

Overview

Below is a set of proposed messages for testing in the Message Matrix Wave 7 (updated vaccines and parents) survey. Proposed messages were selected based on whether they addressed current updated COVID-19 vaccine barriers and motivators. We used insights from message testing and research results across the HHS ASPA COVID-19 Public Education Campaign (e.g., top performers from previous Message Matrix testing) to determine which messages to test.

Note that some messages may need to be updated as new information becomes available about the updated vaccines. We will conduct a final review of proposed messages before fielding to ensure information is up to date (e.g., if vaccine timing changes).  

The survey will be conducted online in English and Spanish. We will recruit three different populations for the survey:

• 3,000 updated vaccine eligible adults (people who have completed their primary series but have not received an updated vaccine; includes people who have and have not received a booster dose in the past)

• 1,000 parents (vaccinated parents of unvaccinated children ages 6 months–17 years; with subgroups for parents with children ages less than 5 years, 5–11 years, and 12–17 years) 

• 250 Spanish-speaking updated vaccine eligible adults (no subgroup analysis)

Note that no single participant will be shown more than 30 messages to review. Participants will qualify as either updated vaccine eligible (19 messages) or parents (21 messages). This will reduce the potential for fatigue and decrease the individual burden of the survey on participants.

Proposed Messages – Updated Vaccine Messages (Max: 30, Current: 19)

Updated Vaccine — Benefits (6)

• Benefits: Death — Vaccines lower your risk of death from COVID. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Benefits: Vulnerable — Everyone who gets COVID can spread it to others. Getting vaccinated is a safe way to protect the people who are most vulnerable. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Benefits: Reduce — I can reduce my chances of getting COVID by getting an updated COVID vaccine.

• Benefits: Less risk — You’re less likely to get COVID if you’re up to date on vaccines, but it's still possible. If you do get infected, your risk of hospitalization and death is lower.

• Benefits: Restore — Whether it’s from getting a vaccine or having COVID or both, immunity doesn’t last forever. An updated vaccine restores protection that has faded over time.

• Benefits: Long COVID — Vaccines reduce your risk of having COVID symptoms for weeks or months, often called Long COVID.

Updated Vaccine — Severity and Risk (8)

• Severity and Risk: Waning Immunity — Over time, your vaccine’s effectiveness at protecting you from COVID could fade. Getting your updated COVID vaccine restores your protection from severe illness, hospitalizations, and death. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Severity and Risk: Chronic Disease — Your risk of getting severely ill or dying from COVID is higher if you have a chronic disease like diabetes, heart disease, or lung disease. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Severity and Risk: Death — Adults who are unvaccinated are 9x more likely to die if they get COVID than those who are vaccinated and boosted. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Severity and Risk: Cognitive Effects — Long COVID symptoms can include cognitive effects like brain fog and confusion.

• Severity and Risk: Long COVID — Common symptoms of Long COVID include extreme fatigue, chronic pain, shortness of breath, difficulty concentrating, memory problems, mood changes, and hair loss.

• Severity and Risk: Work — Getting COVID can keep you out of work and even send you to a doctor or hospital, but for most people the worst part of getting a vaccine is a sore arm.

• Severity and Risk: Hospitalization — Every time you get COVID, you increase your chances of getting Long COVID, ending up in the hospital, or dying.

• Severity and Risk: Natural Immunity — Natural immunity has risks, like ongoing symptoms or Long COVID and spreading COVID to others, that you don’t get from a vaccine.

Updated Vaccine — Information (4)

• Info: Routine — Make an updated COVID vaccine part of your health care routine.

• Info: Seasonal — COVID is now a part of our lives, like the seasonal flu, but you can get vaccinated to protect yourself from these severe respiratory infections.

• Info: Long COVID — Long COVID symptoms—like being short of breath or tired all the time—can keep you from doing the things you love.

• Info: Safe — Millions of Americans have gotten an updated COVID vaccine safely.

Updated Vaccine — Variant Protection (1)

• Variant: Protection — An updated vaccine offers protection against both older and new strains of the COVID virus. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

Proposed Messages — Parent Messages (Max: 30, Current: 21)

Parents — Benefits (8)

• Benefits: Protect — Our children rely on us from day one, and as they grow, we do everything we can to protect them. Protect your child from severe COVID disease that could put them in the hospital with safe and effective COVID vaccines. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Benefits: Severity Protection — Vaccines offer your child increased protection from getting severely ill if they get COVID. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Benefits: Back to Normal — COVID has disrupted children’s lives. COVID vaccines help us keep kids in school and daycare. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Benefits: Natural Immunity — Being vaccinated is a safe way to build protection against COVID. The best way to protect your child from COVID is to keep them up to date with their vaccinations. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Benefits: Severe Outcomes — Vaccines reduce the risk of severe disease, hospitalization, and death from COVID, for both adults and children. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Benefits: School — When they are vaccinated, your kids are less likely to get COVID and miss school.

• Benefits: Family —Keep your family and community safe by getting everyone vaccinated because everybody who gets COVID can spread COVID.

• Benefits: Safety — Clinical trials for COVID vaccines for children ages 6 months to 11 years tested vaccine safety and found the best dose for each age group. The trials showed that COVID vaccines protect children without causing serious safety concerns.

Parents — Risk (10)

• Risk: Unpredictable — Even though many children have had mild cases of COVID, you can’t predict how COVID will affect your child. Protect your child from COVID by keeping them up to date with their vaccinations. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Risk: Hospitalizations — Hospitalizations among children with COVID reached record highs with newer variants. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Risk: Under 5 Infection — Since the beginning of the pandemic, more than 3.5 million children under 5 years have been diagnosed with COVID. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Risk: Death Rate — COVID is ranked as one of the top 10 causes of death for children ages 5 through 11 years. [Wave 6 Top Performer]

• Risk: Heart — Myocarditis, inflammation of the heart muscle, is a very rare illness. A few adolescents, mostly boys, develop mild myocarditis after a COVID vaccination, but children who get COVID are much more likely to get myocarditis—and more severe cases of it as well as other dangerous heart conditions.

• Risk: Long COVID — Even children who don’t need hospital care sometimes have Long COVID—symptoms that can last for months.

• Risk: Worse — You can't predict how COVID will affect your child if they get it. They might be one of the lucky ones and just have the sniffles, but the risk for something much worse is very real.

• Risk: Kids — Throughout the pandemic, kids under 5 years have been more likely than older kids to be hospitalized with COVID.

• Risk: Under 18 Infection — More than 16 million children under age 18 in the U.S. have gotten COVID.

• Risk: Vaccine — Natural immunity has risks that vaccines don’t, including Long COVID and spreading COVID to others. Vaccines help protect your child from getting severely ill if they get COVID.

Parents — Information (3)

• Info: Safe — More than 32 million children have been safely vaccinated against COVID. These vaccines are the most closely monitored in U.S. history.

• Info: Doses — Vaccines for younger children are given in smaller doses tailored just for them.

• Info: Children — CDC and the American Academy of Pediatrics recommend that children, including children who have already had COVID, get a COVID vaccine.