The COVID19 paradox of prevention scale: paradoxical attitudes towards preventive behaviors decrease vaccination willingness

Paradoxical views on the merit of preventive behaviors such as social distancing or vaccination have been spread during different stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. In this article, we present the newly developed Paradox of Prevention Scale measuring such paradoxical anti-prevention attitudes in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. The scale covers people's paradoxical views on the purpose of preventive measures in the pandemic. We used data of five cross-cultural studies conducted in the US, UK, Germany and Austria (N = 1545) at different phases of the COVID-19 pandemic (in July 2020 or February 2021). The new scale consistently showed two distinct dimensions of attitudes in all samples: one reflecting paradoxical views towards prevention measures, and one reflecting the rejection of preventive measures. It was positively correlated with distrust in science and conspiracy mentality, and significantly improved the prediction of people's vaccination willingness. Hierarchical regression models showed that the Paradox of Prevention Scale explained the highest amount of variance when predicting vaccination willingness. The scale will be useful for researchers from different disciplines investigating the interplay between psychological variables and vaccination behavior.