Social media trust predicts lower COVID-19 vaccination rates and higher excess mortality over 2 years

Trust plays a crucial role in implementing public health interventions against the COVID-19 pandemic. We examined the prospective associations of interpersonal, institutional, and media trust with vaccination rates and excess mortality over time in two multinational studies. In study 1, we investigated the country-level relationships between interpersonal trust, vaccination rates, and excess mortality across 54 countries. Interpersonal trust at the country level was calculated by aggregating data of 80,317 participants from the World Values Survey in 2017–20. Data on vaccination rates and excess mortality were obtained from the World Health Organization. Our findings indicated that higher levels of interpersonal trust were linked to higher vaccination rates and lower excess mortality rates in both 2020 and 2021. In study 2, we collected data from 18,171 adults in 35 countries/societies, stratified by age, gender, and region of residence. At the country/society level, interpersonal trust and trust in local healthcare facilities, local healthcare services, and healthcare professionals were associated with higher vaccination rates and lower excess mortality, whereas social media trust was associated with lower vaccination rates and higher excess mortality across three time points over 2 years. Our findings are robust when controlling for country-level covariates of the government stringency index, population density, and medical resources (i.e. critical care beds) in both studies.