PERSUASION (Psych 201 - Chapter 8 - Spring 2014)

This Week’s Playlist
1. Kelly Clarkson
Stronger (What Doesn’t Kill You)

(Attitude Inoculation)
2. The Temper Trap
Science of Fear

(Fear Appeals)
3. Wilco
Walken

(Thought Polarization)
4. Boston
More Than A Feeling

(Many Components/Functions of Attitudes)
5. Mumford & Sons
I Will Wait

(Public Commitment)
6. Gil Scott-Heron
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

(Agenda Control)
7. Justin Timberlake ft. Jay-Z
Suit & Tie

(Source Characteristics)
8. Green Day
American Idiot

(Third-Person Effect)
9. Aretha Franklin
Think

(ELM: Central Route)
10. Neil Diamond
Don’t Think...Feel

(ELM: Peripheral Route)

Chapter 8: 
Persuasion
Melanie B. Tannenbaum, M.A.

Psych 201

Spring 2014

• Commercial: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1zaaoFpTY0

• What’s your attitude toward this laptop?

• A. Very Negative

• B. Negative

• C. Neutral

• D. Positive

• E. Very Positive
The functions of attitudes

The functions of attitudes
• Are you planning on buying a new laptop soon?

• A. Yes

• B. No

!
• Most of you formed an attitude about the laptop

• Why form an attitude if you don’t plan to purchase a laptop in the near future?

!
• This is how we know that attitudes are useful for more than just guiding
imminent behavior…

Current Beliefs
Attitudes lead us to
selectively attend to
information that supports
our current beliefs/attitudes/
world-views
Uhhh, As for everyone!
ICES evals are strongly correlated
with a student’s expected grade
in the course.

This is who I am!
Attitudes allow us to express
our personal values to
others.
You might “like” something on Facebook because of what it
says about you as a person –

you want people to know this information.

Where Am I?
Attitudes allow us to make
sense of the situations in
which we find ourselves.
Those yellow things are live,
10,000 volt wires.

!
Are these people having fun?

This is Electroshock Therapy, an
obstacle from Tough Mudder.

!
If you like obstacle course racing, this
will seem fun to you!

!
If you don’t...it will not.

Where Am I?
This is Electroshock Therapy, an
obstacle from Tough Mudder.

!
If you like obstacle course racing, this
will seem fun to you!

!
If you don’t...it will not.

Persuasion and  
Attitude Change

• The ELM is a dual-process model of persuasion

• What does dual process mean?

• 1. Automatic (Quick, Heuristics)

• 2. Controlled (Deliberate, Rational)
Elaboration-Likelihood Model (ELM)

• 1. Peripheral (Automatic)

• Superficial cues; celebrities, music, pictures, pretty colors!

• 2. Central (Controlled)

• Think carefully/logically; listen to rational arguments

• Don’t worry about the terminology!

• The basic ideas of this model are very simple.

• When you see a message, can think about it a lot or a little

• If you think about it a lot, that means you have elaborated on the
message; this is called “taking the central route”

• If you think about it a little, that means you have not elaborated on
the message; this is called “taking the peripheral route”

• This model lists some factors that make it more likely for a person
to elaborate on a message, as well as the consequences of that
elaboration (or lack thereof)

• When will you use the central route?

• High motivation

• High ability

• What increases motivation?

• Personal Relevance: Message is about something you care about

• Personal Knowledge: Message is about something you know a lot about

• What increases ability?

• Clear presentation, easy to understand

• Attention

• Time

• Not Distracted/Tired

• There are two “routes” to persuasion: Central and Peripheral

• Central

• Will use when there is high ability and motivation

• If you care about something and aren’t distracted, you’ll pay attention
to the logic/rationale of the message

• Arguments, statistics, numbers, logic

• Peripheral

• Will use when there is low ability and motivation

• If you don’t really care or are distracted, you won’t pay a lot of
attention to the message itself; will use superficial cues

• Celebrity endorsements, attractiveness, emotions, pictures

Testing the ELM  
(Petty et al., 1981)
• Gave undergrads a list of arguments for comprehensive exit exams

!
!
!
!
!
• What will happen when motivation is high?

• What will happen when motivation is low?

Motivation

HIGH
Argument Strength
Matters
Source

Matters
Motivation

LOW

Testing the ELM  
• Gave undergrads a list of arguments for comprehensive exit exams

!
!
!
!
• Predictions

• 1. When motivation is high, the strength of arguments will matter

• 2. When motivation is low, the expertise of the source will matter

Testing the ELM  
• Manipulated 3 Things

• 1. Strong vs. Weak Arguments (central)

• Good arguments or bad arguments

!
!
• 2. Source Expertise (peripheral)

• “Commission on Higher Education” or a local HS class

!
!
• 3. Personal Relevance (motivation)

• Will be implemented in 1 year or in 10 years

Testing the ELM  

Testing the ELM  
Low Relevance
• Peripheral cues matter!

!
• More persuasion if you have
pretty pictures, expert sources,
heuristic cues
High Relevance
• Central arguments matter!

!
• More persuasion if you have
strong arguments, numbers,
data, statistics, rational logic

What’s Important  
About The ELM?
Central
• Strong, Logical Arguments

• High Attention

• High Motivation & Ability
Peripheral
• Weaker Arguments

• Low Attention

• Low Motivation & Ability

Test Your Knowledge
• Fuel Economy: Average of 50
MPG, compared with 21 MPG
average for non-hybrid cars.

• Will save the average family
$930 on fuel each year.

• Is this argument...

• A. Central

• B. Peripheral

Test Your Knowledge
• “I’m former vice-president and
environmental activist Al Gore,
and I approve of this car.”

• Is this argument...

• A. Central

• B. Peripheral

Other Possibilities
Central
• Average MPG

• Fuel economy statistics

• Cost

• Horsepower

• Environmental impact statistics

• Information about key safety
measures
Peripheral
• Celebrity endorsement

• Family looking happy as they
drive in the car

• Beautiful pictures of the car
driving on a curvy mountain,
looking sleek and fast

• Upbeat pop music

Five Hour Energy
• What are the central and
peripheral cues?

!
• Are these arguments strong

or weak?

!
• When would someone be
persuaded by this?

Test Your Knowledge
• There are a lot of arguments in favor of
the Samsung Phone in this ad.

!
• The number of arguments is a...

• A. Central cue

• B. Peripheral cue

Test Your Knowledge
• Who is more likely to be swayed by
this ad?

!
• A. Marie, who is alert and attentive.

!
• B. Mallory, who is tired and distracted.

Yale Approach
• Who said what to whom?

!
• Who: Message Source

!
• What: Message Content

!
• Whom: Message Receiver

The Who
• Source Characteristics

• Characteristics of the person who delivers the message

Source Characteristics
• Attractiveness

• More attractive people are more persuasive

• Halo Effect

• Good looking people are assumed to have other good qualities as well

Source Characteristics
• Credibility

• Expertise and Trustworthiness

• Experts are more persuasive than non-experts

• Certain factors can increase trust

The Sleeper Effect
• Messages from unreliable sources tend to be rejected initially (don’t
change attitudes), but over time are accepted (change attitudes)

• This is the most widely studied persuasion phenomenon

The Sleeper Effect
• Why does this happen?

!
• The message and the source are separate pieces of information

!
• Initially stored together, but over time they can become dissociated

!
• No longer remember that you should “discount” the message

• Note: This only occurs if the source credibility is questioned AFTER
the message; if before, you don’t store the message.

The Sleeper Effect
SLEEPER EFFECT: As time goes on,
the initially unconvincing message
becomes more persuasive as you
dissociate it from the uncredible source

The Sleeper Effect
• Step 1: Hear persuasive message. Entertain the idea.

• Step 2: Realize the source is completely untrustworthy. Say,
“Oh. OK, never mind.” Decide you are not persuaded.

• Step 3: Over time, you remember the message, but don’t
remember where you heard it from (or stop connecting the
message to the source; you just know you’ve “heard it”
somewhere).

• Step 4: When all you remember is the message, you are more
persuaded by it than you were right after you heard it, when
you were discounting it because of the source.

Summary: 
The Sleeper Effect
• The Take Home Message:

!
• The sleeper effect is when a message from an unreliable
source becomes more persuasive after a delay.

!
• Over time, the message becomes separated from the
source, so you only remember the message itself (not the
fact that you don’t believe the person it’s coming from).

Test Your Knowledge
• You find out that your friend Jared was flirting with a stranger at a bar,
even though he is dating your other friend Rose. Which of these means
of finding out this information would most likely cause a sleeper
effect?

• A. You saw the flirtation with your own eyes

• B. Your best friend Joel tells you about the incident

• C. Your friend Sam, a notorious gossip who loves spreading rumors, tells
you about the incident

• D. Jared himself tells you about the incident

• E. None of the above

The What
• Message Characteristics

• Quality, clarity, what’s being said

Message Characteristics
• Message Quality

!
• Higher quality messages are more persuasive

• Convey desirable and novel consequences of attitude change

• Appeal to core values of the audience

• Straightforward, clear, logical

Message Characteristics
• Information Vividness

• More vivid messages are more persuasive

!
• Identifiable Victim Effect: Messages that focus on a single, vivid
individual are more persuasive than fact-based messages

Test Your Knowledge
• You have just been hired to raise money for Save The Children.
Which of these pamphlets do you think will work better?
A. Lucky’s Story B. The Horrors of Poverty

Fear Appeals
• Fear can increase or decrease the persuasiveness of a message

!
• Moderate fear combined with instructions for what to do in response to
the fear increases persuasion

!
• Extreme fear causes people to disengage from the message and leads to
decreased levels of persuasion

!
• This is what I research!!! So I am going to share some of my findings
with you ☺

Fear Appeals
• Leventhal et al., 1967

• Anti-Smoking fear appeal campaign

• Participants either...

• 1. Watched a graphic (scary) film about lung cancer

• 2. Read a pamphlet about how to quit smoking

• 3. Watched the film and read the pamphlet

!

Extreme Fear
• Extreme fear simply causes people to tune out the
message, which results in a lack of persuasion

!
!
• Montana Meth Project: http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=QYlwSepW7Bs

Test Your Knowledge
• We just watched a disturbing video from the Montana Meth Project.
Why was this video less effective than it could be?

!
• A. Fear-based persuasion is always ineffective

!
• B. Vivid images make people ignore the commercial

!
• C. Fear-based persuasion is more effective if it is combined with instructions
for how to prevent negative outcomes

!
• D. People are immune to graphic images

The Whom
• Audience Characteristics

• Age

• Young people are more persuadable than old people

The Whom

• Mood

• Feeling negative or positive mood increases persuasion

!
• Emotion acts as a cue that something is important and needs attention. So
mood + strong message = more persuasion.

The Whom

• Need for Cognition (Cacioppo et al., 1996)

• The degree to which someone thinks deeply about things

• High NFC people are persuaded by central cues

• Low NFC people are persuaded by peripheral cues

• Ivan and Nate are co-workers who both
see the following exercise ad. In his free
time, Ivan enjoys doing crossword
puzzles, writing poetry, and thinking long
and hard about new solutions to problems.
Nate prefers playing video games, zoning
out while watching TV, and putting as
little thought into things as possible. Who
is more likely to go for a run after
seeing this ad?

!
• A. Ivan

• B. Nate
Test Your
Knowledge

Summary: 
Persuasion and Attitude Change
• The elaboration likelihood model (ELM)

• Central route vs. peripheral route

• Different features of the persuasive attempt matter under different
circumstances

• Who said what to whom




• The Bottom Line

• Match the persuasive attempt to the audience

Is Media Persuasion Effective?
• Example – Old Spice

• This 2010 commercial became extremely popular in the US
after its release

• As of July 2012, the original commercial had over 41
million views on YouTube, and it had spawned dozens of
spin-off commercials and fan spoof videos.

• This is an example of a successful commercial

• It’s an ad that consumers liked, that people shared with
friends (e.g., via YouTube), and that increased the public’s
attention to the brand

!
!
!
!
!
• Is this a good advertisement?

• A. Yes

• B. No

!
!
!
!
!
• Did you buy Old Spice products as a result of this ad?

• A. Yes

• B. No

!
!
!
!
!
• Do you think others bought Old Spice because of this ad?

• A. Yes

• B. No

!
!
!
!
!
• Does this commercial need to change behavior to be successful?

• A. Yes

• B. No

• Third Person Effect

• Most people assume that persuasive messages (especially ads) have a
strong influence on other people, but not themselves.

• What actually happens?

!
• Media campaigns are rarely effective at changing specific
behaviors (buying a specific product, voting for Politician X)

!
• However, the media can reinforce already existing behaviors… so
an Old Spice campaign may increase attitudes and brand loyalty
without gaining new customers


• Media campaigns are rarely effective at changing specific behaviors
(buying a specific product, voting for Politician X)

!
• However, the media can reinforce already existing behaviors… so an
Old Spice campaign may increase attitudes and brand loyalty without
gaining new customers


• Even though most The Daily Show viewers supported Obama already
and most The O’Reilly Factor viewers supported Romney already, it
probably strengthened those already-existing attitudes and
encouraged viewers to vote!

!
• Strong, consistent attitudes are better predictors of behavior!!


• Media coverage changes our perceptions of reality

!
!
• Topics that are covered frequently are thought to be prevalent

• More crime coverage = we think there is more crime

• More war coverage = we think the current wars are an important issue

!
!
• This is known as agenda control.

The Media and Politics
• Most studies show no significant correlation between the amount a
candidate spends on an election and success in the election

• Political ads have a very small effect on voting behavior

• This doesn’t mean they aren’t important… many elections are very close, and
small effects can make the difference

• These ads mainly influence late-decision voters

• Negative ad campaigns are associated with low voter turnout
(Ansolabehere & Iyengar, 1995)

• Example: For 1992 US senate campaigns, the campaigns that heavily
used negative ads had lower turnout (49.7%) than campaigns that used
little-to-no negative ads (57%)

• Hostile Media Phenomenon

• Most people believe that their own beliefs are reasonable and reflect
an objective assessment of reality.

• Because most news outlets try to present both sides of an issue, most
people believe that the media is biased against their stance.

• Three days before the 1980 presidential election, respondents
were called and asked if the media favored one candidate or the
other leading up to election day.

• 83% of Carter supporters felt that the media favored Reagan

• 96% of Reagan supporters felt that the media favored Carter

Test Your Knowledge
• A public health organization tested the following ad with a focus group. Right
after seeing the ad, the focus group’s attitudes toward drunk driving was
unchanged. This means...

• A. The organization SHOULD NOT run this ad.

• B. The organization SHOULD run this ad.

• C. We can’t tell from this information alone.

Class Activity
• Is a vegan or vegetarian diet a healthy diet?

• Only answer the following if you are NOT and have
never been vegan/vegetarian

• Do you believe the claims in this video are credible?

!
A. Yes

B. No

Class Activity
• Is a vegan or vegetarian diet a healthy diet?

• Only answer the following if you ARE or have ever
been vegan/vegetarian

• Do you believe the claims in this video are credible?

!
A. Yes

B. No

Selective Attention
• Schemas (pre-existing knowledge) guide attention

• Thus, attitudes guide attention

• Selective Attention

• People seek out and tune into information that supports their pre-existing attitudes

• People avoid and tune out information that contradicts their pre-existing attitudes

• Selective attention leads us to maintain current attitudes

Selective Attention  
On Facebook

Selective Evaluation
• Selective Evaluation

• People like things that support their current attitudes and dislike
things that contradict their current attitudes

• Think of self-verification theory

Selective Evaluation  
On Facebook

Selective Evaluation  
On Twitter

• Ziva & Kunda (1990)

• Participants read a New York Times article that described how caffeine
consumption in females is associated with an increased risk of disease

• Lord, Ross, & Lepper (1979)

!
• All participants read two studies about the death penalty

• Study 1: “The death penalty has a deterrent effect”

• Study 2: “Murder rates are higher in capital punishment states”

!
• Thus, all participants read mixed evidence

• Those in favor of the death penalty thought Study 1 was a more
rigorous scientific study than Study 2

• Those against the death penalty thought Study 2 was a more
rigorous scientific study than Study 1

!
!
!
• At the end of the study, each side was MORE EXTREME

• Mixed evidence should have led them to be more moderate!

Thought Polarization
• “Tell me one thing about the death penalty.”

!
• Was the first thing that came to your mind...

• A. Something that supported your attitude?

• B. Something that did not support your attitude?

Thought Polarization
• Thought Polarization: Simply thinking about an issue tends to
produce more extreme, resistant attitudes.

• Tesser & Conlee (1975)

• Measured attitudes toward various social issues

• Participants sat and thought about the issue for a few minutes

• Later, participants reported attitudes again, and they were more
extreme.

• Why does this happen?

• When you are free to think about something, you naturally think
about the arguments you already know – this will reinforce your
current attitude.

Public Commitment
• Publically committing to an attitude or intended behavior increases
resistance to change.

• Telling other people about our likes/dislikes and intentions
“binds” us to those things.

• If you tell your friends “I’m going to run a marathon,” you now
have a new source of motivation for running the marathon; if you
don’t run, your friends may think less of you

• The same thing happens with attitudes

• Most people want to maintain a consistent self-image

• #1 political diss in the past few years? Flip-flopper.

Attitude Inoculation
• Attitude Inoculation: Resisting a “small” attack on our attitude makes
us better able to resist “larger” attacks later on.

• McGuire & Papageorgis (1961)

• Had participants evaluate cultural truisms on a 15 point scale

• “It’s a good idea to brush your teeth after every meal, if possible”

!
• Researchers came up with attacks for each truism

• “Brushing too frequently can damage gums & make teeth vulnerable”

!
• 3 Groups:

• 1. Control Condition

• 2. Received an attack on this truism; told to argue against the attack

• 3. Received an attack on this truism; told to ignore the attack

!
• After a few days, participants given a strong 1-page argument against the
truism and asked to evaluate the truisms again.

If participants got nothing to prepare them for
the huge, long attack, it lowered their support a
LOT.

If participants had practice defending against
the first mini-attack, they were “inoculated”
against the stronger attack.

If participants saw the first mini-attack but
hadn’t gotten practice arguing against it, their
support still dropped.

Test Your Knowledge
• You just saw The Lego Movie and you thought it was
awesome. Identify the correct phrase for each reaction that
you might have.

!
• When you read a negative review of The Lego Movie, you
decide that the reviewer is biased and uninformed.

• A. Selective Attention

• B. Selective Evaluation

• C. Thought Polarization

• D. Attitude Inoculation

Test Your Knowledge
you might have.

!
• After reading a weak, negative review of The Lego Movie,
you attack it. Later, you aren’t swayed by a stronger
negative review.





Test Your Knowledge
you might have.

!
• When you think about the times that you have heard
about The Lego Movie, you can only remember hearing
positive reviews.





Test Your Knowledge
you might have.

!
• The more reviews you read about The Lego Movie, the
more you think about it and the more you like it.





Summary: 
Resistance to Persuasion
• Automatic Processes



• Thought Polarization

!
• Things You Can Deliberately Do To Increase Resistance


• Public Commitment

• Attitude Inoculation

Chapter 8 Summary
• Persuasion and Attitude Change

• Elaboration-Likelihood Model (ELM): Very important!!!!

• Who said what to whom

• Sleeper Effect

• Persuasion and The Media

• The media is not very good at persuasion in the service of a specific
behavior, but the media does influence perceptions of reality

• Resistance to Persuasion

• Can occur automatically as well as deliberately

Top 10 Things To Know
• Sleeper Effect

• ELM

• Central/Peripheral Routes

• When would you use each one?

• What are examples of each one?

• Who said what to whom?




• Fear Appeals
• The “Third-Person” Effect

• Agenda Control



• Ziva Kunda study

• Confirmation Bias

• Resistance to Persuasion

• Attitude Inoculation


PERSUASION (Psych 201 - Chapter 8 - Spring 2014)

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