Fear Arousal in Public Health Campaigns F14 H 571 by Molly Elliott

Green and Witte Can Fear Arousal in Public Health Campaigns Contribute to the Decline of HIV Prevalence? Journal of Health Communication, 2006

1953: Janis and Feshbach publish the first study of fear appeal Fear arousing messages backfire Controversial History of Fear-Based Messages 1980’s ’s: Meta-analyses of fear appeal

EPPM (Witte, 1992, 1998; Witte, Meyer, & Martell, 2001): Reconciles differences in historical literature History of Fear-Based Messages

“Early scare campaigns seem to have little impact on peoples’ actions.” …”we know for example, that public responses to fear messages is [sic] not optimal. It results in short-term behavior change but no behavior change over the long run”.

Uganda’s success story

Why object? Sex-positive Western views object to fear based messaging

Conclusions ’86 - ’91: Strongest fear appeal Mid ’90’s - on: Softer approach Call for bringing fear appeal back