CHAPTER OBJECTIVES

This chapter focuses on the role personality plays in the persuasion process. We typically assume that certain individuals are easy pawns for persuaders. However, research that has explored this issue has uncovered a more complex -- and delightfully more intriguing -- picture. The chapter reviews myths and realities about gullibility, summarizing what we know about the effects of self-esteem, intelligence, and gender on susceptibility to persuasion. Several personality variables do play a role in the persuasion process, and students are introduced to the influences of need for cognition, self-monitoring, and dogmatism on persuasion. Once again, process makes a difference as personality factors influence susceptibility to persuasion through different psychological processes. The chapter concludes by noting that personality not only influences how we receive a message but how we construct it. Two factors -- argumentativeness and verbal aggressiveness -- come into play when we look at individual differences in success at social influence.

TERMS AND ISSUES TO KNOW

Persuasibility: susceptibility to persuasive communications, general tendency to be influenced by persuasive messages.
Need for cognition: stable individual difference in tendency to engage in and enjoy effortful cognitive activity. Individuals high in need for cognition enjoy thinking abstractly. Those low in need for cognition state that thinking is not their idea of fun.
Self-monitoring: propensity to focus on situational or internal cues when deciding how to present the self in a particular context (see chapter 3).
Dogmatism: general tendency to be open or closed to new ideas and innovations.
Argumentativeness: stable trait that predisposes individuals to advocate positions on controversial issues or defend their points of view.
Verbal aggressiveness: tendency to insult and attack others' self-concepts to achieve one's objectives in an argument.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. It is commonly assumed that low self-esteem individuals are highly persuadable. What does research tell us about self-esteem and persuasion, and why might the relationship be more complex than typically believed?
2. Do you think that the role personality plays in persuasion should vary with culture? Thinking about different cultures and subcultures, what hypotheses would you advance about the ways in which culture and personality interact to influence persuasibility?
3. Read over the discussion of self-monitoring, attitude functions, and persuasion. With the functional approach in mind, try your hand at proposing a general theory of persuasibility that emphasizes the functions that attitudes perform for different people.
4. Taking a broader look at persuasibility, discuss how susceptibility to social influence can be a good -- as well as bad -- thing. Broadening matters even further, consider how people outside the cultural mainstream in a society might be susceptible to influence by innovative, rebellious leaders, while those enmeshed in the dominant culture might be closed to new ideas -- yet persuadable by those who hold conventional views.
   

PRACTICE TEST QUESTIONS

1. Persuasibility means:
   a. resistance to persuasion
   b. susceptibility to persuasion
   c. skill in persuading others
   d. political ability
2. Which of these is true about the effects of gender on susceptibility to persuasion?
   a. men are more gullible; they are the weaker sex
   b. women are more susceptible to persuasion due to cultural factors
   c. there is no difference between men and women in persuasibility
   d. there are few sex differences, except in group pressure situations
3. Which of these Elaboration Likelihood Model processes best fits people low in cognition?
   a. peripheral processing
   b. central processing
   d. multiple processing
   d. systematic thinking
4. Attitudes typically serve which function for high self-monitors:
   a. value-expressive
   b. ego-defensive
   c. social adjustive
   d. knowledge
5. Which of these best describes the effects of self-monitoring on persuasion?
   a. high self-monitors need approval from others; they are easy to influence
   b. low self-monitors typically resist social influence attempts
   c. high self-monitors tend to be more influenced by "be yourself" appeals; lows are more swayed by social conformity messages
   d. high self-monitors tend to be more influenced by social conformity messages; lows are more swayed by value-expressive, "be yourself" appeals
6. This type of person is, in general, viewed as a capable, credible communicator who enjoys defending a position in a discussion. He or she is apt to be:
   a. verbally aggressive
   b. high in argumentativeness
   c. dogmatic
   d. physically attractive

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

EXERCISES

1. Conduct a study in which you examine the effect of personality on persuasibility. First, administer one of the personality scales discussed in chapter 8 to a group of people -- for example, the need for cognition, self-monitoring, or dogmatism scale. (In the case of dogmatism, you will have to consult articles or books cited in the references to locate the scale.) Next, devise messages that, the chapter suggests, should have different effects on individuals high or low on this factor. Do the results support the predicted relationships between personality and persuasibility?
2. The self-monitoring concept has stimulated fascinating research on attitudes. The scale has also been criticized on a number of grounds (see articles by Briggs & Cheek, and Slama & Singley in text's references, or review research criticizing the scale that is listed in PsycINFO.) Summarize research criticizing the concept. Do you buy the critics' arguments?

NEWS FEATURES

Attitude functions can help explain why certain messages appeal more to some people than others. Market researchers, apparently aware of this point, have usefully applied functional theory to advertising, notably automobile advertising. One newspaper article, reporting on this research, states that people buy minivans for vastly different reasons than they purchase sports utility vehicles. Advertisers use this information to develop their ads, as described in this article:

"Was Freud a minivan or S.U.V. kind of guy?" by Keith Bradsher, The New York Times, July 17, 2000, pp. A1, A16.

Do you agree with the conclusion of the article? Do you see implications for other automobile or product advertising? Do you think that high self-monitors would be more likely to buy S.U.V.s, and low self-monitors more apt to purchase minivans? Or does this simplify matters? Would you devise different promotional campaigns for minivans and S.U.V.s to high and low self-monitors?