COVID-19 Aftermath in Slovenia: Vaccine Hesitancy, Democratic Engagement and Trust in Public Health Institutions

Wider research context The COVID-19 pandemic has entailed and will continue to entail enormous social, political and health costs. However, how societies, governments, and public health authorities manage the fallout from the pandemic's aftermath will depend on understanding a range of issues, including the post-pandemic patterns and determinants of citizens' vaccine hesitancy, democratic engagement, and trust in public health institutions. The current project aims to study these three phenomena in the post-pandemic period in Slovenian society from several angles. Aims The main goal of our project is a comprehensive investigation of the COVID-19 aftermath in Slovenia, focusing on (COVID-19) vaccine hesitancy, democratic values and political participation, and trust in public health institutions. We consider these three phenomena as core elements that may crucially impact the vulnerability of societies and their successful management of the post-pandemic period. Thus, we aim to (1) longitudinally examine various determinants of (COVID) vaccine hesitancy and to investigate the social, psychological and political mechanisms underlying vaccine acceptance; (2) longitudinally examine changes in pandemic-related determinants of democratic engagement (existential insecurities and various dimensions of wellbeing; 3) design an experimental study to investigate different types of communication strategies by public health institutions and their effects on the perceived trustworthiness of institutions, as well as the public's receptiveness to conspiracy theories. Methods The project will apply a longitudinal panel study design and an online experiment. The first component will consist of an original, four-wave panel study over a period of 8 months on a sample representative of the entire adult population (aged between 18 and over; N = 750). This study design will allow us to examine the dynamics and underlying causal relationships related to (COVID-19) vaccine hesitancy and democratic engagement by accounting for individual idiosyncrasies in examining the effects of interest. The second component will employ an online experiment investigating trust in public health institutions and the role of communication strategies. Innovation There is a limited window of opportunity to study the social, political and public health ramifications of the post-pandemic period. The present study seeks to build the necessary research infrastructure and datasets to study and monitor citizens' democratic engagement, trust in public health institutions and vaccine hesitancy during this critical time.