One of the most important tools available to limit the spread and impact of infectious diseases is vaccination. It is therefore important to understand what factors determine people's vaccination decisions. To this end, previous behavioural research made use of, (i) controlled but often abstract or hypothetical studies (e.g., vignettes) or, (ii) realistic but typically less flexible studies that make it difficult to understand individual decision processes (e.g., clinical trials). Combining the best of these approaches, we propose integrating real-world Bluetooth contacts via smartphones in several rounds of a game scenario, as a novel methodology to study vaccination decisions and disease spread. In our 12-week proof-of-concept study conducted with $N$ = 494 students, we found that participants strongly responded to some of the information provided to them during or after each decision round, particularly those related to their individual health outcomes. In contrast, information related to others' decisions and outcomes (e.g., the number of vaccinated or infected individuals) appeared to be less important. We discuss the potential of this novel method and point to fruitful areas for future research.

翻译：限制传染病传播和影响的最重要工具之一是疫苗接种。因此，理解哪些因素决定人们的疫苗接种决策至关重要。为此，以往的 behavioral 研究采用了以下方法：(i) 受控但通常较为抽象或假设性的研究（例如，情景模拟），或 (ii) 真实但灵活性较差且难以理解个体决策过程的研究（例如，临床试验）。结合这些方法的优势，我们提出一种新方法：通过智能手机整合多轮游戏场景中的真实蓝牙接触数据，以研究疫苗接种决策和疾病传播。在我们为期12周、涉及494名学生的概念验证研究中，我们发现参与者对每轮决策期间或之后提供的一些信息反应强烈，尤其是与个人健康结果相关的信息。相比之下，涉及他人决策和结果的信息（例如，接种疫苗或感染的人数）似乎不那么重要。我们讨论了这种新方法的潜力，并指出了未来研究富有成果的方向。