Sociocultural Antecedents and Mechanisms of COVID-19 Vaccine Uptake among Mexican-Origin Youth

Abstract

Mexican-origin youth, as a large and growing population among U.S. youth, have been disproportionately affected by COVID-19. Understanding what, when, and how sociocultural factors may influence their COVID-19 vaccine uptake could inform current and future pandemic-response interventions promoting vaccination behaviors among Mexican-origin youth. The current study takes a developmental approach to reveal the long-term and short-term sociocultural antecedents of 198 Mexican-origin adolescents’ COVID-19 vaccination uptake behaviors and explores the underlying mechanism of these associations based on the Knowledge-Attitude-Behavior model. The current study adopted Wave 1 (2012–2015) and Wave 4 (2021–2022) self-reported data from a larger study. Analyses were conducted to examine four mediation models for four sociocultural antecedents—daily discrimination, ethnic discrimination, foreigner stress, and family economic stress—separately. Consistent indirect effects of higher levels of concurrent sociocultural risk factors on a lower probability of COVID-19 vaccine uptake were observed to occur through less knowledge about the COVID-19 vaccines and less positive attitudes toward the COVID-19 vaccines at Wave 4. Significant direct effects, but in opposite directions, were found for the associations between Wave 1 ethnic discrimination/Wave 4 daily discrimination and the probability of COVID-19 vaccine uptake. The findings highlight the importance of considering prior and concurrent sociocultural antecedents and the Knowledge-Attitude-Behavior pathway leading to COVID-19 vaccination uptake among Mexican-origin youth and suggest that the impact of discrimination on COVID-19 vaccination uptake may depend on the type (e.g., daily or ethnic) and the context (e.g., during the COVID-19 pandemic or not) of discrimination experienced.

Keywords:

• COVID-19 vaccine uptake
• Mexican-origin youth
• sociocultural factors
• the Knowledge-Attitude-Behavior model

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, Su Yeong Kim, upon reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

Support for this research was provided through awards to Su Yeong Kim from (1) National Science Foundation, Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences (1651128 and 0956123), (2) National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (1R21MD012706-01A1 and 3R21MD-012706-02S1), (3) Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (5R03HD060045-02), (4) Russell Sage Foundation (2699), (5) Spencer Foundation (10023427), (6) Hogg Foundation for Mental Health (JRG-102), (7) Office of the Vice President for Research Creative Grant and Special Research Grant from the University of Texas at Austin, (8) College of Natural Sciences Catalyst Grant from the University of Texas at Austin, and (9) Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (5P2CHD042849-20 and T32HD007081-45) grant awarded to the Population Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.