The importance of socio-demographic determinants and selected personality traits in shaping Poles' attitudes towards vaccination against COVID-19

Paduch Jarosław, Syrowatko Agnieszka, Żołnierczuk Michał. The importance of socio-demographic determinants and selected personality traits in shaping Poles' attitudes towards vaccination against COVID-19. Journal of Education, Health and Sport. 2021;11(10):74-87. eISSN 2391-8306. DOI http://dx.doi.org/10.12775/JEHS.2021.11.10.007 https://apcz.umk.pl/JEHS/article/view/JEHS.2021.11.10.007 https://zenodo.org/record/5579237 The journal has had 5 points in Ministry of Science and Higher Education parametric evaluation. § 8. 2) and § 12. 1. 2) 22.02.2019. © The Authors 2021; This article is published with open access at Licensee Open Journal Systems of Nicolaus Copernicus University in Torun, Poland Open Access. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial License which permits any noncommercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author (s) and source are credited. This is an open access article licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non commercial license Share alike. (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) which permits unrestricted, non commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the work is properly cited. The authors declare that there is no conflict of interests regarding the publication of this paper. Received: 07.10.2021. Revised: 10.10.2021. Accepted: 19.10.2021. The importance of socio-demographic determinants and selected personality traits in shaping Poles' attitudes towards vaccination against COVID-19 Jarosław Paduch Student at the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry at Pomeranian Medical University: Szczecin, PL Agnieszka Syrowatko Master of Psychology, Student at Health Sciences Department at Pomeranian Medical University: Szczecin, PL Michał Żołnierczuk Student at the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry at Pomeranian Medical University: Szczecin, PL Abstract Objective: The aim of this study is to determine the level of particular personality traits and attitudes of Poles towards immunization, including against COVID-19, and to analyze potential predictors of these attitudes. Materials and methods: The online survey, conducted in September and October 2021, included 1466 individuals (50.6% female) aged 18 to 80 years (M = 42.81; SD = 12.46). The anonymous and voluntary online survey included original questions on attitudes toward immunization, including COVID-19 vaccination, rated on a 1-7 scale, past occurrence of NOP, and the Polish adaptation of the Ten Item Personality Inventory (TIPI)-TIPI-PL test. Results: It was shown that significant predictors of the level of acceptance of immunization were female gender, size of residence, education and past occurrence of NOP. In case of personality traits it was agreeableness, emotional stability and openness to experience. Sources of knowledge about vaccination were also significantly related: friends' opinions, Internet and experts' opinions. A higher level of agreeableness and openness to experience was correlated with a higher level of acceptance of vaccinations, whereas a higher level of emotional stability was correlated with a lower level of acceptance of vaccinations. Female gender, higher education and size of town of residence predisposed to acceptance of immunizations, whereas occurrence of vaccine adverse effect predisposed to low level of acceptance. Key words: COVID-19, Big Five, TIPI-PL, vaccine acceptance, personality trait