Clarkson University–Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Bioethics Program; Geisinger Health System, Center for Translational Bioethics and Health Care Policy
University of Pennsylvania - Department of Psychology
Date Written: February 5, 2021
Abstract
We partnered with Walmart to test 22 nudges designed to boost vaccination rates in their pharmacies. Nudges were delivered via text message to over 650,000 Walmart pharmacy patients in the fall of 2020 and encouraged patients to visit Walmart for a flu vaccine. We demonstrate that behaviorally informed messages increase pharmacy vaccination rates by an average of 6.7% over a roughly three-month follow-up period. The most effective messages in our field experiment matched the tone of typical pharmacy communications and reminded patients that a flu shot was waiting for them. These insights suggest that carefully crafted messages informed by the results of this study could nudge the adoption of other vaccines for other infectious diseases, including COVID-19.
Keywords: vaccination, COVID-19, nudge, influenza, field experiment
Milkman, Katherine L. and Patel, Mitesh S. and Gandhi, Linnea and Graci, Heather and Gromet, Dena and Ho, Quoc Dang Hung and Kay, Joseph and Lee, Timothy and Bogard, Jonathan and Brody, Ilana and Chabris, Christopher and Chang, Edward and Chapman, Gretchen B. and Dannals, Jennifer and Goldstein, Noah J. and Goren, Amir and Hershfield, Hal and Hirsch, Alex and Hmurovic, Jillian and Horn, Samantha and Karlan, Dean and Kristal, Ariella and Lamberton, Cait and Meyer, Michelle N. and Meyer, Michelle N. and Oakes, Allison and Schweitzer, Maurice E. and Shermohammed, Maheen and Talloen, Joachim H. and Warren, Caleb and Whillans, Ashley and Yadav, Kuldeep and Zlatev, Julian and Berman, Ron and Evans, Chalanda and Snider, Christopher and Tsukayama, Eli and Van den Bulte, Christophe and Volpp, Kevin and Duckworth, Angela, A Mega-Study of Text-Message Nudges Encouraging Patients to Get Vaccinated at their Pharmacy (February 5, 2021). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3780356 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3780356
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