The Daily Mail (U.K.) reports the findings of a study done by Carnegie-Mellon University researchers who looked at resistance to Covid-19 vaccination related to education level. I'm semi-positive they believed they'd find that the more education someone had the greater acceptance of vaccination.
Long time readers know I love counterintuitive findings, and the CMU folks got them. The hypothesized relationship held for everyone with a masters degree or less. So, those with a masters were less vaccine hesitant than those with a baccalaureate degree, who were less hesitant than those with some college who were less hesitant than those with no college.
However, those with more than a masters - two categories labeled (1) professional degree and (2) Ph.D. - bucked the trend. Those in the professional degree category were more vaccine resistant than those with a bachelors or masters degree. And those with a Ph.D. were the most vaccine resistant of all categories, more of them were vaccine hesitant than any other category, some 23.9% of Ph.D.s didn't want to take the Covid vaccines.
In round numbers, a quarter of Ph.D.s distrusted the Covid-19 vaccines, more than any other group, including high school dropouts. If you are not acquainted with large numbers of Ph.D.s, perhaps you are surprised by these findings. Needless to say I'm not.
Tell me one out of four Ph.D.s is highly "eccentric" and I'll reply the estimate is probably low, I'd guess it is closer to half. We're a very quirky group.
