Things we can manipulate Message Types

Implicit vs. Explicit Persuasion Processes (Kardes et al., 1994) conclusions “You should…” Pros: & straightforward, Cons: being told what to do or message Previous research always supported this approach (Fine, 1957; Hovland & Mandell, 1952) , but today, may only work best with those with low to no interest or knowledge of topic (Kardes et al., 1994) *They want me to…* Pros: Think more , b/c we come up with them ourselves Cons: Can fail to draw (miss the point) Current research supports this approach IF recipient is in topic or IF person is about topic (Kardes et al., 1994) or IF person has high (Martin, Lang, & Wong, 2003-4) – due to ELM processes (Sawyer & Howard, 1991)

Gain-framed vs. Loss-framed messages Gain-frames Make the message all about the Lead people to messages moreso Viewed (O’Keefe & Jensen, 2007) Loss-frames Make the message all about People process/analyze these messages (O’Keefe & Jensen, 2007) People than (adults, maybe not adolescent brains) As a result… willing to take greater risks to avoid or recoup losses (Tversky & Kahneman, 1981) BUT depends on what the is (e.g., dental hygiene vs. STD prevention, weight loss, etc.) (Latimer, Salovey, & Rothman, 2007)

Quantity vs. Quality of Arguments According to ELM… is a type of cue (Petty & Cacioppo, 1984) People in topic more persuaded by People in topic more persuaded by , then quantity of quality arguments Sooo… If you think audience will scrutinize your message, use arguments. If you think audience doesn’t care about topic, then use of varying quality (Gass & Seiter, 2011)

Using Evidence… Different persuasive claims require different . Evidence is one type. Narratives, personal anecdotes, statistics, quotations, testimonials, graphs, charts, etc., physical evidence As long as evidence , it is almost always persuasive (Reinard, 1988) of evidence matters more for Evidence can be a (ELM) (e.g., quantity of it impresses audiences without thinking)… But BEST used so that receivers process it more (Reynolds & Reynolds, 2002; Stiff, 1986) Evidence also increases (O’Keefe, 1998) – to a ceiling effect point (Reinard, 1988) TYPE of evidence best used is debatable in the research. Recent meta-analysis concluded over (Allen & Preiss, 1997) – but only when receiver in topic. Otherwise, anecdotes/narratives are more persuasive for low-involvement peeps (Braverman, 2008) OBVIOUSLY… using both is best.

Take-home: Self-Application Reading Fun #10 (due on Message NVs lecture day) Find the BEST and the WORST examples you can of websites… Based on the persuasion reading, Find one done exceptionally well – very persuasively Fine one done incredibly poorly – they tried to be persuasive, but just sucked…