Psych 2121 - Lecture 9: Persuasion

ways misconceptions spread

• sticky ideas

• contagious ideas

sticky ideas

memorable - simple, unexpected

believable - routes to persuasion

core idea + compact (system 2 - system 1)

1. find the core idea, what is the most important idea, take away?

2. compact, reduce the amount of information needed to convey the idea

contagious ideas

emotion, triggers, public display, stories

unexpected ideas

scheme violations are better remembered and more likely to be shared with others. to get attention and spread ideas, it can be useful to break an expected pattern/schema

what factors lead to persuasion?

• source attractiveness, expertise, fame, certainty

• quality of arguments

• number and length of arguments

• consensus information

persuasion routes

central route

peripheral route

central route

(system 2) personally relevant issue, knowledge of issue, have some personal responsibility. people think carefully and deliberately about the content of a persuasive message, attending to its logic and the strength of its arguments as well as to related evidence and principles. will be swayed when arguments are strong, not when they are weak

peripheral route

(system 1) not personally relevant issue, not particularly knowledgable, system 2 is busy/distracted, tired, limited ability to attend. people attend to relatively easy-to-process, superficial cues related to a persuasive message, such as its length or the expertise or attractiveness of the source of the message. may rely on simple heursitics. attitude change less affected by argument strength, only process peripheral cues

source characterisitics

characteristics of the person who delivers the message

• attractiveness

• credibility

• certainty

message characteristics

aspects of content of a persuasive message, including the quality of the evidence and the explicitness of its conclusions

• message quality

• vividness (key arguments imaginable, interesting, memorable)

• fear

• culture (match values and norms)

emotional ideas

people share their experiences that involve emotion. more likely to share that same day, with close others, when emotion is more intense. the spread of information and ideas is sometimes driven by emotional experience and content.

situational triggers

activate memories, thoughts, beliefs, and courses of action. the mind (system 1) is an associate machine

ex: left-right, cat-dog, etc

public display

we use others to extract useful information, we imitate, don’t want to be seen as odd (norms)

stories

stories engage people and trigger our meaning making capabilities and imagination/simulation

stories integrate features of sticky and contagious ideas (simple, memorable, built with schemas, personal/emotional)

elaboration likelihood model (ELM)

a model of persuasion that maintains there are two routes to persuasion: the central route and the peripheral route. determined by levels of motivation and ability to tend to the message

attractiveness

attractives sources are particularly persuasive when the message isn’t personally important and when people don’t have much knowledge in the domain. celebrity spokesperson

credibility

persuasive because they seem expert and trustworthy. toothpaste commercials with dentists

certainty

people judge certain and confident sources to be more credible. food reviews - this is the best italian meal i’ve ever had

sleeper effect

an effect that occurs when a persuasive message from an unreliable source initially exerts little influence but later causes attitudes to shift. over time, people dissociate the source of the message from the message itself

message quality

high quality messages are more persuasive. stronger when they appeal to audiences core values, straightforward, clear, logical. more attitude change when the conclusions are explicit - “here’s the takeaway”

fear

when persuading people to avoid some dire outcome, frightening the audience about just how terrible the outcome would be. key is to include clear, concrete steps on how to address the fear as to not disrupt the careful message

identifiable victim effect

the tendency to be more moved by the vivid plight of a single individual than by the struggles of a more abstract number of people rather than statistics. ex: UNICEF ad

audience characteristics

characteristics of those who receive a persuasive message, including…

• need for cognition

• mood

• age

need for cognition

degree to which people like to think deeply about things. people with high need for cognition are more persuaded by high-quality arguments and relatively unmoved by peripheral cues. people with lower need for cognition are persuaded by easier-to-process peripheral cues

mood

persuasive efforts tend to be successful when the mood of the message matches the mood of the audience

age

younger people are more likely to be persuaded, peripheral route is likely to be more effective

shared attention

when people believe they’re attending to a stimulus at the same time as many others, they are inclined to process the stimulus more deeply, resulting in persuasion via the central route. ex: televised political speech

agenda control

efforts by the media to emphasize certain events and topics, thereby shaping which events people think are important. prominence given to certain issues in the news

hostile media phenomenon

the tendency for people to see media coverage as biased against their own side and in favor of their opponents side. people attend selectively to information that confirms their original attitudes. we tune in to info that reinforces our attitudes and tone out info that contradicts them. people tend to evaluate info - such as the credibility of sources in ways that support their own beliefs

thought polarization hypothesis

hypothesis that more extended thought about a particular issue tends to produce a more extreme attitude. public commitment. moral attitudes , fundamental beliefs, can be resistant to persuasion

public commitment

declaration of ones attitudes in a public setting make people resistant to attitude change. its hard to back down from endorsements without losing face

attitude inoculation

small attacks on peoples beliefs that engage their preexisting attitudes, prior commitments, and background knowledge, enabling them to counteract a subsequent larger attack and thus resist persuasion