Existential Approaches to Vaccine Hesitancy: Terror Management Theory

COVID-19 provides one of the few real-life case studies to examine vaccine hesitancy. This chapter examines a brief history and a comparison to the 1918 flu against the polarized nature of Americans and how this led to a stronger us vs. them mentality, leading to anger regarding vaccines. Specifically, under the guidance of Terror Management Theory (TMT), this chapter discusses why many Americans hesitated to take the vaccine and provides some existential implications for this phenomenon while also discussing a path forward for future pandemics.