Are opposition leaders more effective for the COVID-19 vaccination campaign than leaders of the ruling party?

Last registered on September 30, 2021
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Are opposition leaders more effective for the COVID-19 vaccination campaign than leaders of the ruling party?
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0008293
Initial registration date
September 26, 2021

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
September 30, 2021, 4:55 PM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Country
Bangladesh
Region
South Asia

Primary Investigator

Name
Ferdous Sardar
Affiliation
Bryant University
Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

Additional Trial Information

Status
Completed
Start date
2021-09-19
End date
2021-09-30
Keywords
Health
Additional Keywords
COVID-19, vaccine hesitancy, role model, health behavior, political leaders
JEL code(s)
I12, I18, D81, D910, O120
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial is based on or builds upon one or more prior RCTs.
Abstract
In this study, I test whether endorsement by political leaders affects people’s perception about COVID-19 vaccine and vaccine intention and whether the effect varies by the affiliation of the politicians. I conduct a randomized controlled trial among 4500 households in Bangladesh. The three arms of the RCT are: (1) the households in the first group receive information about the COVID-19 symptoms, risks, prevention, and vaccination (2) the households in the second group receive the same information and are informed that key ruling party leaders also received the vaccine, and (3) the households in the third group receive the same information and are informed that key opposition party leaders also received the vaccine. This document outlines the research methodology, the outcome variables, and the analysis plan.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Sardar, Ferdous. 2021. "Are opposition leaders more effective for the COVID-19 vaccination campaign than leaders of the ruling party?." AEA RCT Registry. September 30. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.8293-1.0
Sponsors & Partners
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Households will randomly receive either of the following three treatments:

Treatment 1: receive information about the COVID-19 symptoms, risks, prevention, and vaccination
Treatment 2: T1 + information about the vaccination of ruling party leaders
Treatment 3: T2 + information about the vaccination of opposition party leaders
Intervention Start Date
2021-09-19
Intervention End Date
2021-09-30

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Perception about the vaccine effectiveness
Perception about the vaccine risk
Vaccination plan
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
4500 households from 900 paras (neighborhoods) will be treated in this study. 900 paras are randomly assigned into the following three treatment arms:

Treatment 1: receive information about the COVID-19 symptoms, risks, prevention, and vaccination
Treatment 2: T1 + information about the vaccination of ruling party leaders
Treatment 3: T2 + information about the vaccination of opposition party leaders

Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
The randomization was done in Stata and stratified by administrative unit (upazila).
Randomization Unit
Randomization is done at para (cluster) level.
Was the treatment clustered?
Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
900 paras (neighborhoods)
Sample size: planned number of observations
4500 households.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
Treatment 1: 1500 households from 300 paras
Treatment 2: 1500 households from 300 paras
Treatment 3: 1500 households from 300 paras
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Study parameters: • Significance = 0.0500 • Power = 0.8000 • Intraclass correlation 0.3000 Primary outcome variables 1& 2: perception about vaccine effectiveness and risk Unit of measurement: Likert-type scale (1 to 4) • MDE: 0.1347 Primary outcome variable 3: vaccine intention Unit of measurement: binary variable with 1 for intend to get vaccinated and 0 for no intention to take the vaccine • MDE: 0.0634 (assuming control proportion = 0.3000)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
University of washington
IRB Approval Date
2021-07-02
IRB Approval Number
MOD00010372 (Modification #1) for STUDY00013539
Analysis Plan

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Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials