Research
Methodology: policy valuography
Using what we refer to as multisited policy valuography, we investigate practices on five sites that are of particular relevance to vaccination. We study these sites in individual work packages (i) official policy settings (WP PROGRAM), (ii) primary care (WP CARE), (iii) pharmaceutical industry (WP PHARMA), (iv) scientific research (WP RESEARCH) and (v) social media (WP DIGITAL). We examine a comprehensive range of valuation perspectives and associated forms of governance: those of policy officials, parents, pediatricians, industry actors, scientists, and participants in online debates.
WP Program
WP Program investigates how vaccines and vaccination are valued and evaluated in policymaking. We particularly seek to understand how different evidence is assessed and how social, economic, or ethical values come to matter in designing vaccination campaigns.
WP Research
WP research investigates what constitutes valuable scientific research and knowledge to researchers involved in the development of vaccines and related technologies. We draw on interviews with researchers, funding bodies, university administrators as well as thematic document analysis.
WP Care
In WP Care, we are concerned with the role of values in parents’ decision-making regarding childhood vaccination. To understand what drives parents’ decisions, we draw on ethnographic observations in primary care settings and interviews with health care professionals and parents. Specifically, we focus on vaccines offered free of charge in the framework of the Austrian national immunization program.
WP Pharma
WP Pharma focuses on the valuation of vaccines by members of the pharmaceutical industry and how these valuations are embedded in particular legal systems. Second, since valuations change over time, WP PHARMA also looks at the emergence of “immunization economics” and the powerful appeal economic reasoning enjoys in contemporary political debates. Empirically, this project is based on a set of qualitative interviews and archival research.
WP Digital
In this work package, we use a range of digital methods to understand how different communities (e.g. provaccine, antivaccine, neutral, inasmuch as these are distinguishable) use digital spaces. Second, we examine parents’ discussions on the value of vaccination in online forums using qualitative analysis. In this workpackage, we collaborate with Sam Martin and Sam Vanderslott of the Oxford Vaccine Group.