Message Factors (Factors Influencing Persuasive Effectiveness)

How does PMT framework provide a basos for thinking about adapting persuasive messages to audiences?

- PMT has indentified some important influences on protective intentions and actions and thus suggest that PMT-based assessments can be useful in identifying potential foci for influence efforts.

What can PMT assessments indicate?

-PMT-based assessments may indicate whether to focus on threat security, threat vulnerability, response efficacy, or self efficacy.

What are the moderating factors of the DITF strategy?

1) Bigger boost in compliance, when there is no delay inbetween the two requests or else the guilt dissipates. 2) Bigger boost in compliance, when the same person makes the two requests b/c a different person would reduce the guilt. 3) Bigger boost in compliance, when the two requests have the same beneficiary/institution b/c same as 2) 4) There is bigger boost in compliance between control condition and DITF strategy, when the requests come from pro-social organizations (i.e. charity: civic, environmental...etc) b/c there's more guilt when saying no to a charity.

What are the two parts of threat appeal? Give example questions.

1) Defining the variations in strength of fear appeal is by reference to the properties of the communication • i.e. "Are the messages with stronger content more effective than those with weaker contents?" 2) Defining fear appeal by reference to the degree of fear aroused in the audience • i.e. "Are messages that arouse greater fear more effective than those arousing lesser fear?"

What are the moderating factors to FITD strategy?

1) No obvious external justification b/c it has to accommodate the observed effects as to why the moderate variables work the way they do. 2) The larger the 1st request is (as long as people still comply), the more successful it is b/c it boosts self-perception 3) More effective when the requests come from pro-social organizations (i.e. non-profits) b/c its easier to think of yourself as good when you give to the charity rather than a business

Identify two necessary conditions for prompts to be effective in influencing behavior.

1) Positive attitude b/c people have to have the appropriate type of attitude 2) High PBC b/c people have to think they can do it

What factors influence the point of inflection on this curve of the relationship between discrepancy and attitude change?

1) Source credibility a) The point of inflection is reached at lower discrepancies by lower credibility sources than a high-cred source (meaning that if we want someone to change their attitudes a lot, we need to demonstrate that we are really credible). 2) Issue involvement

What is a prompt?

A simple cue that makes appropriate behavior relevant/salient

In advertising contexts, how do 1S messages and NR2S messages differ in persuasiveness and credibility?

In advertising contexts, NR2S messages are MORE credible but NOT more persuasive. And in non-advertising contexts, NR2S messages are significantly LESS persuasive but NOT different in credibility

What are the effects of the citations of evidence sources on persuasive outcomes?

Information-source citation directly enhances acceptance of the relevant supporting argument in two possible ways: 1) Through careful scrutiny (in which it's important to cite high-cred sources) 2) Through some heuristic process (in which, citing any information source might enhance persuasion

What is the general picture of the relationship between discrepancy and attitude change?

It has a curvilinear relationship with attitude change

How does skepticism about advertising possibly underlie the different effects of NR2S messages in advertising contexts as opposed to nonadvertising contexts?

It may be that perceivers' initial skepticism about consumer advertisement freely acknowledges (and does not refute) opposing considerations, the advertiser's credibility is enhanced.

Does the successfulness of explicitly stating a message vary depending on the audience's education level?

No, probably because of assimilation and contrast effects.

Does the successfulness of explicitly stating a message vary depending on the audience's initial favorability toward the advocated view?

No, probably because of assimilation and contrast effects.

What are the 2 factors that influence Threat Appraisal?

Perceived Threat Severity (how bad is the threat) and Perceived Threat Vulnerability (the person's perception of how likely it is that it'll happen to them)

What is a One-sided message?

One that offers arguments supporting the advocated position

What is a Two-sided message?

One that offers both the supporting and contradicting positions

What are the two factor that influence coping appraisal?

Perceived Response Efficacy (the person's perception the recommended action is effective in dealing with the problem) and Perceived Self-Efficacy ([PBC] the person's perception on whether they're able to perform the action).

What is Protection Motivation?

Protection Motivation refers to persons' motivations to adopt protective behaviors in the face of possible threats.

Generally, are refutational two-sided messages more credible or are one-sided messages perceived as more credible?

R2S, compared to 1S messages, are perceived as more persuasive and more credible.

What does the research evidence suggest about the relative persuasive effectiveness of stating the message's conclusion explicitly as opposed to omitting the conclusion (leaving the conclusion implicit)?

Research suggests that it's more persuasive to explicitly state the conclusion rather than omitting the conclusion.

Describe the self-attributional explanation of FITD effects and how it accounts for the observed moderating factors.

Self-attributions, which is the idea that compliance with the 1st request enhances people self-perceptions concerning their cooperativeness & their helpfulness. That in return helps with compliance of the next request.

What are two alternative ways in which Threat Appraisal and Coping Appraisal might combine to yield protection motivation?

Simultaneously and Sequentially • If Threat Appraisal is low then they don't do Coping Appraisal • If Threat Appraisal is high, then they go to Coping Appraisal. ~ If Coping Appraisal is high, then it's high PMT ~ If Coping Appraisal is low, then they don't adopt the recommended action, and they perhaps go back and examine their Threat Appraisal.

What might explain the observed differences between advertising messages and other persuasive messages in how NR2S messages work?

The credibility of consumer advertising is boosted by the use of NR2S messages, but NR2S messages on other persuasive topics do not produce the same enhancement of credibility.

What does the research evidence suggests about the persuasive effectiveness of providing a general description of the advocated action as opposed to a more specific one?

The more specific the better, probably because of contrast and assimilation effects.

What is Protection Motivation Theory (PMT)?

The theory that a fear appeal message employs what amounts to a problem and recommends a solution (the advocated action).

What is Threat Appeal?

The use of fear as a persuasive technique (i.e. "if you don't do what I recommend," the communicator suggests, "then these terrible things, fearful consequences will befall you").

Are these effects explained by the effect that citation has on perceptions of the communicator's credibility? And do citations affect persuasive outcomes differently for high-credibility and low-credibility communicators?

These effects are NOT explained by the effect that evidence source citation has on perceptions of the communicators credibility b/c the high and low cred communicators SHOULD NOT BENEFIT EQUALLY from citing their evidence sources, and YET BOTH HIGH AND LOW CREDIBILITY COMMUNICATORS ARE MAKE MORE PERSUASIVE by citing their sources of information.

What is the relationship between the intensity of threat-appeal contents and the degree of fear aroused in receivers?

Threat Appeals and fear arousal → (not easy to fine tune the level of fear) 1. Messages with more intense contents do general arouse greater fear and anxiety. 2. Messages that arouse greater fear, are generally more persuasive 3. Messages with generally more intense contents are fairly more persuasive that those with less intense contents 4. These relationships do NOT have an inverted U shape (see handout) 5. Under two conditions more intense threat appeals are unlikely to be any more persuasive than less intense threat appeals.

What are the two processes underlying protection motivation?

Threat Appraisal and Coping Appraisal

Describe two alternative conceptions of the role played by the emotion of fear.

Under two condition more intense Threat Appeals are unlikely to be any more persuasive than less intense threat appeals: 1) Where the recipient's fear level is already relatively high 2) When the recipients do NOT have a sufficiently positive assessment of the recommended action

What is a Nonrefutational Two-sided message (NR2S)?

Where you overwhelm them with supportive messages, and less contradicting messages (NOTE: both sides are presented without trying to discredit the contradicting side)

What is Coping Appraisal?

is a person's assessment of the recommended action.

What is Threat Appraisal?

is a person's assessment of the threat

D. What is door-in-the-face (DITF) strategy?

→ Initial request (i.e. asks someone to at least spend 2 hors a week for 2 years with big brother and big sister program) → Target Request (i.e. asks someone to spend 2 hours on one field trip)

What is Foot-in-the-door (FITD) Strategy?

→ Initial request (i.e. sign a petition, sign up for something...etc) → Target Request (i.e. another organization asks them to put up this big ugly sign) → Conclusion: FITD can be successful, but sucessfulness varies!

Describe the guilt-based explanation of DITF effects.

→ The idea is that the refusal of the first request arouses guilt, and acceptance of the second request reduces that guilt → The concern is how it handles variation in the requester. This is a problem b/c of the transgression-compliance effect.

Describe the reciprocal-concessions explanation of DITF effects.

→ The idea that the sequence of requests makes the look like a bargaining/negotiating situation (i.e. labor management agreements) → The concern is that it doesn't accommodate all the moderate variable affects (i.e 4th moderating factor → greater for pro-social organizations) → Concession size doesn't influence the success of the strategy

What is a "transgression-compliance effect"?

→ Transgression compliance affect is said to occur when a person is more likely to comply with a request after they have done something wrong. Meaning that they guilty person can get rid of their guilt by doing something nice for someone else unrelated entirely to the situation

What is a Refutaional Two-Sided Messages (R2S)?

→ Where both sides are presented, however, the contradicting side is discredited → Limited condition being that the contradicting argument isn't bogus

What does NOT matter for FITD strategy?

→ Whether or not both requests come from same person → Whether or not the two requests are related material