The Effect of Foreign Language Use on Human Papillomavirus Vaccine Intentions

Due to globalization, people increasingly need to make decisions and judgments in a foreign language rather than their native language environment. This thesis examines whether the use of a foreign language has an impact on vaccination intentions. Previous research suggested that the use of a foreign language might decrease perceived risks and increased perceived benefits by influencing their overall affective evaluation of relative risk. Based on this, I hypothesized that foreign language use would increase people's willingness to get the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine by decreasing the perceived risks of the vaccine and increasing its perceived benefits. The data collection for this study is still ongoing. Based on the data obtained thus far, although the results are not significant, the use of a foreign language might actually reduce vaccination intentions of participants by decreasing their perceived risks of HPV infection. In order to further investigate the effect of foreign language use on vaccination intentions, future studies should examine the effect of foreign language use on the perceived risks of HPV infection and the perceived risks of HPV vaccine independently