PERSUASION AND

ATTITUDE CHANGE

P R E S E N T E D BY:R I YA N P O RT U G U E Z

ATTITUDE CHANGEAn significant modification of an individual's attitude. In the persuasion process this involves the communicator, the communication, the medium used, and the characteristics of the audience. Attitude change can also occur by inducing someone to perform an act that runs counter to an existing attitude.

PERSUASION• It is the act to cause people to do or believe in something.•Two general orientations based on several literature:

a. people’s use of arguments to convince othersb. active participation of the person.

PERSUASIVE COMMUNICATION•Message intended to change an attitude and related behavior, of an audience. • Carl Hovland was contracted by US War Department to investigate how propaganda could be used to rally support for the American was effort.

Note: the key to understanding why people attend to, understand, remember and accept a persuasive message is to study the characteristics of the person presenting the message, the contents of the message, and the characteristics of the receiver of the message.

COMMUNICATIONS THEORY• It is the approach by Yale University based on Hovland’s.• Advertising and Marketing used this theory.•Hovland, Janis, and Kelly asked “who says what to whom and with what effect?” and studied the three general variables in persuasion:

a. the communicator, or the source (who)b. the communication, or the message (what)c. the audience (to whom)

APPLICATION WHO: SOURCE FACTORS• Experts are more persuasive than non-experts. The

same arguments carry more weight when delivered by someone who seems to know all the facts (Hovland & Weiss, 1952). • Popular and attractive communicators are more effec-

tive than unpopular or unattractive ones (Kiesler & Kiesler, 1969). • People who speak rapidly are more persuasive than

people who speak slowly. Rapid speech gives an impression of 'I know what I'm talking about' (Miller, Maruyama, Beaber & Valone, 1976).

WHAT: MESSAGE FACTORS• We are more easily persuaded if we think the message is not

deliberately intended to manipulate us (Walster & Festinger, 1962). • A message in a powerless linguistic style (frequent hedges,

tag questions, hesitations) is less persuasive than one in a powerful linguistic style. A powerless style gives a negative impression of both the arguments and the speaker (Blankenship & Holtgraves, 2005). • • Messages that arouse fear can be very effective. For

example, to stop people smoking we might show them pictures of cancerous lungs (Leventhal, Singer & Jones, 1965).

APPLICATION

WHOM: AUDIENCE FACTORS• People with low self-esteem are persuaded more easily

than people with high self-esteem (Janis, 1954). • People are sometimes more susceptible to persuasion

when they are distracted than when paying full attention, at least when the message is simple (Allyn & Festinger, 1961) • People in the 'impressionable years' are more

susceptible to persuasion than those who are older (Krosnick & Alwin, 1989).

APPLICATION

THIRD-PERSON EFFECTMost people think that the are less influenced than others by advertisements. For audience to remember the product and change their attitude:a. The discrepancy variable should be minimalb. Repetitionc. Feard. Facts vs Feelingse. The medium and the messagef. Framing a messageg. Sleeper effect, the impact of a persuasive message can

increase over time when a discounting cue, such as an invalid source, can no longer be recalled.

THE YALE APPROACH TO COMMUNICATION (HOGG & VAUGHAN, 2011)

Proc

essMessage

Order of Arguments1 vs 2 Sided ArgumentsType of AppealExplicit vs Implicit Conclusion

Fact

ors

Attention

Out

com

esOpinion change

Perception change

Proc

essSource

LikeabilityExpertiseRaceTrustworthinessStatus

Fact

ors

Comprehension

Out

com

es

Affect change

Proc

essAudience

Initial positionSelf-esteemIntelligencePersuasibilityPersonality

Fact

ors

Acceptance

Out

com

es

Action Change

INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCESAge Visser and Krosnick (1998) and Tyler and Schuller (1991) have suggested five hypotheses about a relationship between age and susceptibility to attitude change: • Increasing persistence • Impressionable years• Life stages• Lifelong openness• PersistenceOther variables:• Disconfirmation bias, the tendency to notice, refute and regard as weak,

arguments that contradict our prior beliefs. • Cognitive bias

DUAL-PROCESS MODELS OF PERSUASION

• According to Petty and Cacioppo's elaboration-likelihood model (ELM), when people receive a persuasive message they think about the arguments it makes. However, they do not necessarily think deeply or carefully, because to do so requires considerable cognitive effort. People are cognitive misers who are motivated to expend cognitive effort only on issues that are important to them. Persuasion follows two routes, depending on whether people expend a great deal or very little cognitive effort on the message.

• Chaiken's heuristic-systematic model (HSM) deals with the same phenomena using slightly different concepts, distinguishing between systematic processing and heuristic processing. Systematic processing occurs when people scan and consider available arguments. In the case of heuristic processing, we do not indulge in careful reasoning but instead use cognitive heuristics, such as thinking that longer arguments are stronger. Persuasive messages are not always processed systematically. Chaiken has suggested that people will sometimes employ cognitive heuristics to simplify the task of handling information.

DUAL-PROCESS MODELS OF PERSUASION

COMPLIANCESuperficial, public and transitory change in behavior and expressed attitudes in response to requests, coercion or group pressure.

TACTICS FOR ENHANCING COMPLIANCE• Ingratiation. A person attempts to influence others by first

agreeing with them and getting them to like him/her. (Ingratiator’s dilemma)• Reciprocity principle is another tactic, based on the

social norm that 'we should treat others the way they treat us'. If we do others a favor, they feel obliged to reciprocate. • Multiple requests. Instead of a single request, a two-step

procedure is used, with the first request functioning as a set-up or softener for the second, real request. Three classic variations are the foot-in-the-door, the door-in-the-face and low-balling tactics

MULTIPLE REQUEST

Image from Hogg & Vaughan, 2011

MINDLESSNESSThe act of agreeing to a request without giving it a thought. A small request is likely to be agreed to, even if a spurious reason is provided.

ATTITUDE-BEHAVIOR DISCREPANCY AND COGNITIVE DISSONANCE

• Cognitive Dissonance, its major premise is that cognitive dissonance is an unpleasant state of psychological tension generated when a person has two or more cognitions (bits of information) that are inconsistent or do not fit together. Cognitions are thoughts, attitudes, beliefs or states of awareness of behavior.• According to the selective exposure hypothesis, people are

remarkably choosy when potentially dissonant information is on the horizon. Exceptions are when their attitude is either: (1) very strong, and they can integrate or argue against contrary information, or (2) very weak, and it seems better to discover the truth now and then make appropriate attitudinal and behavioral changes

COGNITIVE DISSONANCE LEADS TO THE

UNDERSTANDING OF:• people's feelings of regret and changes of attitude

after making a decision; • their patterns of exposing themselves to and

searching for new information; • reasons why people seek social support for their

beliefs;

EFFORT JUSTIFICATION AND INDUCED COMPLIANCE

• A special case of cognitive dissonance: inconsistency is experienced when a person make" a considerable effort to achieve a modest goal.

Act is

voluntary

Much

effort

expended

Goal first rated as negative

Cognitive

dissonance

Goal rated as positive

INDUCED COMPLIANCE• It is a special case of cognitive dissonance:

inconsistency is experienced hen a person is persuaded to behave in a way that is contrary to an attitude.

THE ROLE OF SELFSELF-CONSISTENCYThis idea that self-consistency is crucial for dissonance is taken up in a slightly different guise.The key idea is that if your self-concept is evaluatively challenged in one domain then you can rectify the problem by publicly making positive statements about yourself in another domain.

ALTERNATIVE VIEW TO DISSONANCE• SELF-PERCEPTION THEORY

Berm's idea that gain knowledge of ourselves only by making self-attributions: for example, we infer our own attitudes from our own behavior.

A view that integrates self-perception and dissonance theories suggests that when your actions fall within your range of acceptance, self-perception theory best accounts for your response. So, if you had been willing to pay up to 25 per cent more than your original budget, there is no real conflict: 'I suppose I was willing to pay that little bit more.'

REVISED COGNITIVEDISSONANCE BY

COOPER AND FAZIO (1984)

Image from Hogg & Vaughan, 2011

RESISTANCE TO PERSUASION

REACTANCE• People try to protect their freedom to act. When they

perceive that this freedom has been curtailed, the will act to regain it. • Research suggests that when we feel this way, we

often tend to shift in the opposite direction, an effect known as negative attitude change. • Brehm felt that the underlying cause of reactance is a

sense of having our per-sonal freedom infringed.

FOREWARNING• Advance knowledge that one is to be the target of a persuasion attempt. Forewarning often produces resistance to persuasion.• Inoculation, a way of making people resistant to persuasion. By providing them with a diluted counter-argument, they can build up effective refutations to a later, stronger argument.

ROLE OF ATTITUDE ACCESSIBILITY AND STRENGTH

• Accessible attitudes come to mind more easily and are likely to be stronger.• An attitude that is accessible and strong is more

resistant to persuasion. If we consider the case of inoculation, the initial threat to one's attitude that might be posed by a persuasive message makes the attitude more accessible. Further, accessibility can be increased by forming counter-arguments.