“Exploring Science Literacy and the Literacy Communities of the Anti-Vaccination Movement”

by Wyn Andrews-Richards | Xchanges 11.2

Proud Anti-Science Moms

Let’s return to the original Facebook post from the pregnant woman who didn’t want the TDap vaccine. Two weeks after her initial posting, the original poster typed, “I am no longer pregnant and my baby boy is perfectly healthy and vaccine free !! The doctor even told me that if I didn’t get it my baby would come out dead and he wanted me to know so he wouldn’t feel bad for being the reason of not informing me. Smh. I just laughed.” It is doubtful that this conversation truly happened with this young woman’s physician. But, she is clearly using her own personal story with some added scare tactics to deliver her argument.

Interestingly, after more encouragement from other commenters, the original poster states, “I’m just so glad I did my research. My husband isn’t completely on board with me but he said whatever I decided he’s right there with me. Sadly we got the vitamin k shot because the stupid doctor mentioned in front of my husband that if my son doesn’t get it then he can get a blood clot and die !!! Instantly scared my husband.” Two words mentioned in this post are of great significance – “research” and “scared.” The poster refers to doing her research. Yet, and this is a commonality in the conversations I’ve observed in all of these groups, she doesn’t specify what “research” means. There is no indication that this young woman spoke with a large sample of immunologists, virologists, or physicians regarding the scientific process as it pertains to vaccines. Most likely, “research” is reading a sample of blogs, articles, and opinion pieces on the Internet that coincide with the already held beliefs that vaccines are dangerous.

Although this literacy community sample is very small, and perhaps not completely indicative of this individual woman’s personal literacy practices, it does reveal a complicated intersection of literacy — science and technology. The majority of Facebook users have the technological literacy required to access a website. However, it is questionable whether users have the literacy required to discern whether a website is reliable and trustworthy. Many Internet users do not know the differences between a blog post (oftentimes pure opinion), a researched news story, or a scholarly, peer-reviewed article, let alone why the differences are so critical.