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Vaccine Nationalism Counterintuitively Erodes Public Trust in Leaders

Colombatto, Clara; Everett, Jim AC; Senn, Julien; Maréchal, Michel André; Crockett, MJ; (2023) Vaccine Nationalism Counterintuitively Erodes Public Trust in Leaders. Psychological Science 10.1177/09567976231204699. (In press). Green open access

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Abstract

Global access to resources like vaccines is key for containing the spread of infectious diseases. However, wealthy countries often pursue nationalistic policies, stockpiling doses rather than redistributing them globally. One possible motivation behind vaccine nationalism is a belief among policymakers that citizens will mistrust leaders who prioritize global needs over domestic protection. In seven experiments (total N = 4,215 adults), we demonstrate that such concerns are misplaced: Nationally representative samples across multiple countries with large vaccine surpluses (Australia, Canada, United Kingdom, and United States) trusted redistributive leaders more than nationalistic leaders—even the more nationalistic participants. This preference generalized across different diseases and manifested in both self-reported and behavioral measures of trust. Professional civil servants, however, had the opposite intuition and predicted higher trust in nationalistic leaders, and a nonexpert sample also failed to predict higher trust in redistributive leaders. We discuss how policymakers’ inaccurate intuitions might originate from overestimating others’ self-interest.

Type: Article
Title: Vaccine Nationalism Counterintuitively Erodes Public Trust in Leaders
Location: United States
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1177/09567976231204699
Publisher version: https://doi.org/10.1177/09567976231204699
Language: English
Additional information: This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions.
Keywords: Trust; utilitarianism; COVID-19; vaccine redistribution; vaccine nationalism; open data; open materials; preregistered
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > Div of Psychology and Lang Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > Div of Psychology and Lang Sciences > Experimental Psychology
URI: https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10182244
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