A team of language experts at the University of Nottingham has joined a multi-agency campaign to tailor health communications and improve the accessibility of immunisation communications.
The campaign, which launched across London on Monday 7 October 2024, aims to help raise awareness about the importance of vaccinations – particularly within communities where vaccine uptake is lower – and create space for open conversations.
With London facing some of the lowest vaccination rates in the UK, this campaign focusses on real stories from local residents, healthcare professionals and community leaders, with the aim of building trust and encouraging informed choices. It's not just about getting vaccinated – it's about understanding why it matters and feeling confident in that decision.
Professor Svenja Adolphs and Dr Emma McClaughlin from the Centre for Research in Applied Linguistics (CRAL) in the School of English and Horizon Digital Economy Research advised on the campaign, which was a collaboration between the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), London Integrated Care Board (ICB) teams, NHS England (London Region), led by London Councils and ADPH London (Association of Directors of Public Health London).
Together with Dr Sara Vilar-Lluch, who is now based at Cardiff University, the team drew on new linguistic tools to assess accessibility, developed by Professor Kathy Conklin in CRAL, and carried out linguistic analyses of different proposed messages to inform the campaign and advise on the evaluation.
The way in which we talk about vaccination plays a key role in decision making. In campaigns such as this, it is vital that the language meets the needs of target audiences - in terms of linguistic complexity - and that it reflects preferences for how individual messages are framed."
The involvement of the Nottingham team came from their initial research carried out on the UKRI-funded project Coronavirus Discourses, which responded to the need to tailor health communications to cater for diverse audiences in an information environment that was constantly changing as the pandemic progressed.
Professor Adolphs, who led the research, explained further: "Linguistic analysis of various messaging styles alongside co-production with different communities can contribute to the accessibility of public health messages and make them more engaging. We've been able to use our research into linguistic evidence for effective public health messaging developed during the pandemic, as well as using new tools to assess linguistic complexities developed by colleagues within CRAL on this campaign."
The findings from the Coronavirus Discourses project were published as a guide for health communications professionals – containing insights into public preferences for sources of health information and the effectiveness of different messaging types and framing of instructions. These insights were presented at the UKHSA Conference 2023, leading to considerable interest from public health professionals and policy makers.
Effective vaccination communication is key to addressing misconceptions and building trust. This campaign highlights the importance of developing messages that resonate with communities experiencing lower vaccine uptake. By applying insights from linguistics and health literacies, we can make these messages more impactful, directly boosting vaccine confidence and enabling informed decision making. These insights can also be applied to other regionally focused public health messaging campaigns, further advancing health equity."
Why We Get Vaccinated is a three-year campaign which will run in line with the National NHS Immunisation Strategy and is being developed as a core thread for the London Immunisation Strategy.
Ysabella Hawkings, Public Health Communications Network Chair at ADPH London, said: "The expertise that the University of Nottingham team has provided has been so valuable to help ensure the language we use in this campaign is accessible and understandable to as many people as possible. Their experience in this area has been insightful and helped shape the approach."
