Social Cultivation of Vaccine Refusal and Delay among Waldorf (Steiner) School Parents

Abstract

U.S. media reports suggest that vastly disproportionate numbers of un- and under-vaccinated children attend Waldorf (private alternative) schools. After confirming this statistically, I analyzed qualitative and quantitative vaccination-related data provided by parents from a well-established U.S. Waldorf school. In Europe, Waldorf-related non-vaccination is associated with anthroposophy (a worldview foundational to Waldorf education)—but that was not the case here. Nor was simple ignorance to blame: Parents were highly educated and dedicated to self-education regarding child health. They saw vaccination as variously unnecessary, toxic, developmentally inappropriate, and profit driven. Some vaccine caution likely predated matriculation, but notable post-enrollment refusal increases provided evidence of the socially cultivated nature of vaccine refusal in the Waldorf school setting. Vaccine caution was nourished and intensified by an institutionalized emphasis on alternative information and by school community norms lauding vaccine refusal and masking uptake. Implications for intervention are explored.

Vaccine Rejecting Parents’ Engagement With Expert Systems That Inform Vaccination Programs

“…This finding echoes those of a number of other studies (Sobo 2015;Benin et al 2006;Brownlie and Howson 2005). The parents we interviewed saw the pharmaceutical industry as exerting a wide-ranging influence on vaccination research, the motives of health professionals, and the construction of government policy consensus.…”

Influences on Immunization Decision-Making among US Parents of Young Children

“…As a result, some states have reduced or eliminated philosophical exemptions to childhood vaccines required for school entry (Jones and Buttenheim 2014; Oregon Health Authority 2013). Meanwhile, less attention has been paid to the equally critical issue of how parents’ vaccination decision-making is shaped by social values and community norms within networks (Frew et al 2014; Kennedy and Gust 2005; Sobo 2015). …”

Parenting as politics: social identity theory and vaccine hesitant communities

“…Above, we demonstrated how parents learn from favoured networks how to make socially salient vaccination decisions (Sobo, 2015). We orient towards those we think are like us, and to whom we aspire to be like, basing our decisions on their beliefs and attributes.…”

“…(Such individualism also lends itself to the individualised methodology of many studies, which may have obscured the groupness of VHR until recently.) In addition, subjects in Sobo (2015) and Rogers and Pilgrim (1995) identify as critical thinkers. VHR parents see themselves reaching enlightened conclusions via personal investigation and analysis.…”

“…The literature we report below suggests that a new tool engaging with lifestyle practices could capture the fault-lines constituting vaccination identities, thereby validating 'cultural cognition' in the vaccination context. Meanwhile, Sobo (2015) explicitly identified an appropriate community in which to apply the 'cultural cognition' framework. While Kahan did not believe that cultural cognition was occurring in a mass context, Sobo found it alive and well at the local level.…”