Chapter 8 - Persuasion

Question 1

1. Describe the elaboration likelihood model
   a. Distinguish between the central and peripheral routes to persuasion
   b. Identify the conditions that make it more likely that a message will be
   processed via the central rather than the peripheral route (be prepared to
   apply to examples)
   i. Summarize research evidence

Answer 1

• Elaboration likelihood model (ELM): A model of
  persuasion maintaining that there are two different
  routes to persuasion—the central route and the
  peripheral route (Petty & Cacioppo, 1986)

a.
-The Central Route to Persuasion
* Followed when people think
carefully & deliberately about
about the content of a
persuasive message,
attending to its logic and the
strength of its arguments, as
well as to related evidence
* Thus, attitudes will be
influenced primarily by the
strength of the arguments
-The Peripheral Route
to Persuasion * Followed when people primarily
attend to peripheral cues
superficial, easy
-to process features
of a persuasive communication that
are tangential (peripheral
) to the persuasive information itself * E.g., # of arguments, expertise or
attractiveness of the source of the message

b.
-Motivation
* Major factor
shaping motivation to
think about the
message: * Relevance of
the message
to one’s goals
& interests
-see razor study example (rewatch video or check textbook…)
-Ability
* Even if a person is motivated to
think carefully about a
message, may be unable to do so because of distractions or demands on their attention
* In this case, will take the
peripheral route to persuasion
-university tuition example

• For persuasion to occur via the central route, we have to
  be both motivated and able to engage in more in-depth
  processing
• If either motivation or ability (or both) is lacking,
  persuasion generally relies on peripheral cues
• For long-lasting attitude change, persuasion through
  the central route is preferable

Question 2

2. List and define source characteristics and describe their influence on persuasion
   a. Describe the sleeper effect

Answer 2

Source Characteristics: Characteristics of the person who delivers a persuasive
message, such as attractiveness, credibility, and certainty

• Credibility (aka believability): perception that
  the communicator is both knowledgeable & trustworthy
• Credible communicators are more persuasive (ex: doctor vs random magazine)
• The appearance of credibility can persuade
  via the peripheral route

Conveying Trustworthiness
* One way is to “express an opinion” without making the audience aware that it is the target of a persuasion
attempt
-example: whisper campaign + grad students discussing opinion but participants think grad student is not aware of p’s presence
* Another way is to argue against one’s own self-interest (ex: persecutor should have more power or not? When persecutor says no and goes against logical self-interest, seems more credible)

Certainty
* Sources who express their views with certainty and
confidence tend to be more persuasive
* E.g., jurors judge credibility of eyewitnesses based on
the confidence they express when giving their
testimony (Wells et al., 1981)
* If your goal is to persuade someone, be sure to express
lots of confidence

Attractiveness
* Attractive spokespeople are more persuasive, even for topics completely unrelated to attractiveness
* Can serve as peripheral cue: attractive people are rated more favorably, and those favorable
feelings become associated with the message
* But effect can also take place via central route when it’s an argument for the validity of the
message

b. * Sleeper effect: effect wherein people remember the message but forget the source; thus, the effect of
credibility diminishes over time
* Particularly likely to happen when people learn about
the credibility of the source after being exposed to
the message
-example of credible vs magazine source and 4 weeks later

Question 3

3. List and define message characteristics and describe their influence on persuasion
   a. Describe the identifiable victim effect

Answer 3

Message Characteristics:
* Aspects, or content, of a persuasive message, including the quality of the evidence and the explicitness of its conclusions

Message Quality
* Strong messages:
* Are comprehensible, straightforward, logical
* Appeal to core values of audience
* Have an explicit take-away message
* High-quality messages are more persuasive in general,
especially for people who are strong in motivation and
ability

Message Lenght
* If audience takes the central route, message length can either increase or decrease persuasion
* Longer message can be more persuasive if contains more supporting arguments
* But adding weak arguments or repeating arguments can
backfire
* Long messages can also drain audience’s cognitive resources
* If peripheral route, longer messages tend to be more
persuasive

Vividness
* When information is vivid —colorful, interesting, and memorable —it tends
to be more effective
-vivid article example (see textbook?)

Fear
* Fear messages contain vivid information and can be very persuasive (Tannenbaum et al.,
2015)
* But fear messages are most
effective when combined with instructions on how to avoid negative outcomes (Leventhal et
al., 1967; Devos
-Comby & Salovey,
2002)

Culture
* It can be important to tailor a message to fit the norms,
values, and outlook of a particular cultural group
* American ads emphasize individuality & benefits to the
individual; ads in collectivist cultures like those of East
Asia focus on benefits to the collective

a. Identifiable Victim Effect
* The tendency to be more
moved by the vivid plight
of a single individual than
by a more abstract
number of people
Ex: 3,600 refugees & migrants have died crossing the Mediterranean Sea in 2015 At least 30% of the crossing deaths have been children
vs. picture of drowned child on the beach

Question 4

4. List and define audience characteristics and describe their influence on
   persuasion

Answer 4

Need for Cognition
* Drive to think deeply about judgments
* E.g., “I really enjoy a task that involves coming up with
new solutions to problems” VS.
* “I think only as hard as I have to”
* People high in need for cognition are more persuaded by central route messages than by peripheral route messages
* Especially likely to be swayed by message supported by strong
arguments, & not to be swayed by message supported by weak arguments (Cacioppo et al., 1983)

Self-Monitoring
* Tendency to monitor our behaviour to fit the current situation
* Susceptible to messages
conveying potential to project a desirable self
-image
* E.g., willing to pay more for a bottle of Canadian Club whisky when it’s pitched as enhancing one’s status
rather than when it’s pitched as a high-quality product

Mood
* One way to instill positive feelings toward the message is to deliver it when audience is in a good mood
* E.g., Ps more convinced by
persuasive messages
when given a snack (Janis
et al., 1965)
* Messages are processed
more closely when they
match the mood of the
receiver

Age
* Younger people are
more persuadable than
older people
* Older people may have
strong and long-held
attitudes that are
resistant to change
* Children may be most
vulnerable to persuasion attempts

Knowledge
* Attitudes based on more knowledge are more resistant to change
* Having greater knowledge means we can offer more
and better counterarguments to defend our attitude

Question 5

5. Explain the concept of agenda control and its role in media effects

Answer 5

??? See textbook

Question 6

6. Describe how attentional biases and selective evaluation increase resistance to persuasion

Answer 6

Selective Attention
* Preexisting attitudes may
resist change by guiding
which information is
attended to
-ex: legalizing marijuana example

Selective Evaluation
* We tend to evaluate information in biased ways to support our preexisting opinion
* For instance, recall that when people were presented
with results of studies favoring or opposing their
positions on the death penalty, they believed the
studies that supported their position and questioned
those studies that didn’t
-example capital punishment

Question 7

7. Describe how previous ideological commitments increase resistance to persuasion and define the thought polarization hypothesis

Answer 7

Previous Commitments &
Resistance
* Public commitments to certain attitudes make them
resistant to change
* Publicly discussing or announcing an opinion will make it resistant to change because we want to appear
consistent

Thought Polarization Hypothesis
* The hypothesis that more extended thought about a
particular issue tends to produce a more extreme,
entrenched attitude

Question 8

8. Describe how attitude inoculation increase resistance to persuasion

Answer 8

• Attitude inoculation: Exposure to small attacks on
  people’s beliefs enables them to counteract a
  subsequent larger attack and thus resist persuasion
  (McGuire, 1964)
• Particularly effective when people play active role in
  generating counterarguments
• Attitude inoculation for challenges to cultural truisms
  (widely held beliefs generally accepted with
  questioning)
• E.g., “everyone should see a doctor at least once a year”
• Half of Ps “inoculated” by exposure to weak arguments
  against truism (e.g., this would swamp medical facilities)
• Several days later, all Ps presented with stronger
  arguments against truism
• Ps who had previously been exposed to weak arguments were less persuaded by the stronger arguments