CHAPTER OBJECTIVES

This chapter focuses on the centerpiece of persuasion: the message. It attempts to illuminate the diverse, intriguing, and complex effects that message factors have on attitudes. The first section introduces message structure, helping students appreciate the impact of one-sided versus two-sided messages, and conclusion drawing on attitudes. The chapter next discusses evidence -- factual appeals -- and explores intellectual controversies involving types of evidence that are most persuasive. A key message factor is the fear appeal, and the chapter focuses in depth on fear-arousing messages, examining psychological dynamics of fear message effects. The final portion of the chapter takes a linguistic turn. It explores such language factors as speed of speech, powerless language, and language intensity on attitudes. After reading the chapter, readers should have a deeper understanding of the psychological subtleties of message effects, increased respect for the role theories play in scholarly investigations, and, finally it is hoped, greater appreciation of the many effects messages have in everyday life.

TERMS AND ISSUES TO KNOW

One-sided versus two-sided messages: a message structure factor that compares the effects of a one-sided message that presents one perspective on the issue with a two-sided communication that offers arguments on behalf of both the persuader's position and the opposition.
Conclusion-drawing: message structure factor that examines effects of drawing the conclusion implicitly or explicitly.
Meta-analysis: a study of other studies that uses statistical methods to determine the strength of findings in an area.
Evidence: factual assertions spanning statistics, eyewitness accounts, testimonials, and narratives that are used to support a communicator's claims.
Vivid case history: a personalized, emotionally engaging, in-depth story of one person's experiences; sometimes referred to as narrative evidence.
Fear appeal: a persuasive communication that tries to scare individuals into changing their attitudes by conjuring up negative consequences that will occur if they do not comply with message recommendations.
Illusion of invulnerability: perception that the self is invulnerable to negative life events, or that one is less likely to experience bad outcomes than others.
Extended Parallel Process Model: integrative theory of fear appeals that articulates processes mediating fear message effects and conditions under which fear appeals are likely to fail or succeed.
Powerless speech: a constellation of characteristics, including hesitations, tag questions, and disclaimers, that can suggest to a message receiver that the communicator lacks power.
Intense language: a collection of linguistic elements, such as metaphors, vivid language, emotionally-charged words, and profanity, that richly convey the extremity of a communicator's position.
Sleeper effect: in its simplest form, the notion that the effects of a persuasive communication increase with the passage of time; a message initially discounted by message receivers, such as one delivered by a low-credible source, comes to be accepted over time for various cognitive reasons.
Frame: central organizing idea for making sense of relevant events and suggesting what is at issue; the dominant framework a message adopts toward an issue.
Transportation: process by which fiction persuades; absorption in a work of art that takes people to different mental realms and in this way influences attitudes.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. Consider whether messages should be structured differently, depending on whether they are delivered interpersonally or over the Web. Do you think conclusions about message structure effects discussed in chapter 7 will hold for persuasive public relations efforts conducted over the Internet? Given the nonlinear, creative aspects of Web sites, what sorts of hypotheses would you venture about how best to structure a persuasive message prepared for a Web site?
2. It initially seems like some factors can be called rational message factors and others emotional factors. Why is the difference between rational and emotional messages more complex than ordinarily assumed? Can we separate out rational from emotional message characteristics; if so, how?
3. Fear appeal theories ironically place little emphasis on fear. Instead they emphasize cognitive factors. Summarize the ways that cognitive processes mediate fear appeal effects in the Extended Parallel Process Model. Next discuss whether persuasion models like this one place too little -- or just the right amount -- of emphasis on fear.
4. When do you think profanity could enhance persuasion? Under what conditions should it reduce persuasion? Is it ethically inappropriate to use profanity and intense language when this offends other people? Or is this an effective way to raise their consciousness?
5. Think of an important problem the nation faces. Write a political speech, using frames, language attributes, and message characteristics to construct a compelling political oratory.
   

PRACTICE TEST QUESTIONS

1. You are considering whether to deliver a one-sided or two-sided message on a controversial campus issue. What does the research suggest you should do to be most effective?
   a. prepare a one-sided message that forcefully gives your side of the issue
   b. give a sharply-worded two-sided appeal that ignores the opposition's side
   c. deliver a two-sided message that refutes opposition arguments
   d. prepare a one-sided, two-sided, and three-headed message
2. The illusion of invulnerability states that:
   a. people assume they are more prone to misfortune than others
   b. people assume they are less likely to experience negative life events than others
   c. women assume that they more susceptible to bad things than men
   d. people take more risks as they get older
3. A fear appeal succeeds if it:
   a. moves the person into danger control
   b. moves the individual into fear control
   c. goes easy on the person, failing to arouse fear
   d. gets the person feeling nervous
4. The statement that "chewing Nicorette gum can help smokers quit the habit" plays up which of these factors:
   a. severity
   b. susceptibility
   c. response efficacy
   d. self-efficacy
5. Research on powerless speech shows that:
   a. powerful speech is always more effective than powerless speech
   b. powerless speech, while usually not so effective, can benefit a persuader when the goal is to appear humble and more humane
   c. powerful speech, while usually more effective, does not work when men address women
   d. a tag question is the same as a disclaimer
6. The sleeper effect finds that:
   a. people fall asleep when reading statistical studies
   b. a message from a highly credible source becomes more persuasive over time, as source and message become disassociated
   c. a message from a low-credible source can become more persuasive over time, as source and message become disassociated
   d. a message changes people's feelings over time, but not their thoughts.
7. Frames play an important role in political language. Which of these most accurately describes a frame?
   a. simple, rather than complex, language, as used by Ronald Reagan
   b. a central organizing idea, as epitomized by the term “death tax”
   c. an abstract ideology, like conservatism
   d. a strong, passionate attitude, like patriotism

Answers: 1: c, 2: b, 3: a, 4: c, 5: b, 6: c, 7: b

EXERCISES

1. Talk to professional persuaders in various walks of life who regularly devise fear appeals. These could include health care practitioners, physicians, MADD volunteers, drug abuse counselors, and AIDS prevention workers. Interview them in depth, asking them how they use fear to help people change unhealthy behaviors. Try to uncover their "theories' of fear appeals and compare what they say to academic research discussed in chapter 7. Do they implicitly employ fear appeals concepts? Could they benefit from using these ideas? Specifically, how?
2. Locate persuasive materials, such as pamphlets, brochures, and web sites, from advocacy groups. These could include activists on both sides of the abortion, gun control, capital punishment, environmental growth, animal rights, or Arab-Israeli issue. Analyze their communications for intense language, looking at metaphors, graphic word use, and emotionally-charged words, as well as pictures. How do they use intense language? What types of specific categorizations can you make? What sorts of effects should such language have, according to research?
3. Think of a movie, novel, song, or other work of art that changed your attitudes or altered our perspective toward life. How did this happen? Take a personal tour of the experience, calling on narrative and transportation principles to help identify the psychological processes by which the work of art changed you.
   

NEWS FEATURES

One of the continuing issues in message research is the impact of vivid images and language on attitudes. This has theoretical and important practical implications, as glimpsed by a newsmagazine article on AIDS in Africa. The magazine's cover stated simply: "This is a story about AIDS in Africa. Look at the pictures. Read the words. And then try not to care." Locate in the library or the Internet the following special report from Time Magazine:

"The hand of death: Scenes from the AIDS front," Time, February 12, 2001, with pictures beginning on p. 26.

The article, a journalistic although partly persuasive effort, includes graphic pictures, along with moving, emotional passages and statistics on the spread of AIDS on the African continent. Describe the ways the article uses pictures, vivid language, and numerical evidence to attempt to influence readers and mold attitudes. Based on theory and research in chapter 7, what impact do you believe the language and varying types of evidence will have on attitudes and beliefs? Using the Time article and the research as a guide, how would you use intense language, imagery, and evidence to influence attitudes toward AIDS in the U.S.?