ArticleFrontiers in psychology2026
Social media use and expectations predict COVID-19 vaccine side effects: a prospective longitudinal study.
Article in Frontiers in psychology, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Objective: Social media use has been implicated in the development of anti-vaccine attitudes. However, its connection with the post-vaccination experience itself remains unclear. The present longitudinal study examined how expectations and psychosocial factors are associated with the relationship between exposure to reports of COVID-19 vaccine side effects on social media and observers' post-vaccination side effect experience. Design and setting: Prospective longitudinal study using online surveys. Participants and outcome measures: Five hundred thirty-eight adults residing in Australia indicated the burden (i.e., number of symptoms and related severity) of COVID-19 vaccine side effects seen reported by other users on social media and their own expectations of experiencing post-vaccination side effects (T1). Perceptions of social media and psychosocial beliefs were also measured. Experience of vaccine-attributed side effects were self-reported after participants received their first (T2; Results: There was a significant positive association between social media side effect burden exposure and the side effect burden experienced after receiving the first dose. Pre-vaccination side effect expectations formed an indirect association between these variables, but not for the exposure-second dose association. Worry about COVID-19 vaccine side effects, greater side effect severity experienced by known others, and stronger vaccine misconceptions strengthened the first dose indirect association through expectations. Conclusion: Exposure to user-posted health information on social media was positively associated with post-vaccination side effect experiences and the pre-vaccination expectations associated with this relationship were modulated by several psychosocial factors. Health interventions should consider the potential role of social media-derived symptom information on negative health outcomes.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.