ABSTRACT
In Australia, COVID-19 vaccination is recommended for unvaccinated pregnant women to mitigate the risk of harm in pregnancy from COVID-19 infection. During the pandemic, pregnant women were hesitant to vaccinate and reported vaccination safety concerns. Women consulted with others about COVID-19 vaccination and pregnancy, including healthcare professionals, friends and family members. However, women’s communication practices have received little attention following the pandemic. This study drew from social representations theory to investigate how women discussed COVID-19 vaccination and pregnancy in regional New South Wales, Australia. Sixteen women (Mage = 32) who were pregnant during the pandemic participated in six interviews and two focus groups. A dialogical analysis explored how themes, risk and distrust circulated in conversations. Tension was evident in women’s talk, where women’s frequent discussion of risk posed by the COVID-19 virus and vaccination ran counter to constraints in discussing risk in their everyday lives. Silence emerged as a communication genre women utilised to navigate tension in discussing risks associated with COVID-19 vaccination and pregnancy, and underpinned the thematisation of risk/safety and trust/distrust in discourse. This dynamic conceptualisation underscores the heterogeneous and sometimes subtle ways in which tension in talk shapes community responses to vaccination.