The debate on vaccines in social networks: an exploratory analysis of links with the heaviest traffic

Abstract:

This study aims to analyze Internet traffic and interactions on social networks concerning vaccines. The 100 most widely shared, liked, and commented links were visited with the keyword “vaccine” from May 2018 to May 2019 to identify the main subjects, sources, and positions. The qualitative study phase used Discourse Analysis to identify modes of production of principal meanings in the chats. We further studied the fake news in the most widely shared links. The results point to a majority position in favor of vaccines (87.6%) and strong interest in health-related themes, scientific development, and health policies. Meanwhile, some of the mostly widely accessed sources of information in Brazil had no information on editorial criteria, policies, or authors, making it difficult to determine the quality and veracity of the information consumed in social networks in Brazil. Fake news accounted for 13.5% of the links with the heaviest traffic, raising concerns about misinformation on vaccines. These results point to important communication dynamics related to vaccines and opportunities to improve public communication on vaccination.

Keywords:
Vaccines; Social Networking; Scientific Communication and Diffusion