Chapter 6

Question 1

What is attitude change?

Answer 1

Any 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

Question 2

What is cognitive dissonance?

Answer 2

State of psychological tension produced by simultaneously having two opposing cognitions. People are motivated to reduce the tension, often by changing or rejecting one of the cognitions. Festinger proposed that we seek harmony in our attitudes, beliefs and behaviours and try to reduce tension from inconsistency among these elements. Similarly, affect, behaviour and cognitions are not always congruent so there is a change in attitude or behaviour

Question 3

What is persuasive communication?

Answer 3

Message intended to change an attitude and related behaviours of an audience.

Question 4

What is the third-person effect?

Answer 4

Most people think that they are less influenced than others by advertisements

Question 5

What is a source?

Answer 5

The point of origin of a persuasive communication.

Question 6

What is a message?

Answer 6

Communication from a source directed to an audience.

Question 7

What is an audience?

Answer 7

Intended target of a persuasive communication.

Question 8

What is disconfirmation bias?

Answer 8

The tendency to notice, refute and regard as weak, arguments that contradict our prior beliefs.

Question 9

What is the elaboration-likelihood model (ELM)?

Answer 9

Petty and Cacioppo’s model of attitude change: when people attend to a message carefully, they use a central route to process it; otherwise they use a peripheral route. This model competes with the heuristic–systematic model and is a part of dual process theory

Question 10

What is the heuristic-systematic model (HSM)?

Answer 10

Chaiken’s model of attitude change: when people attend to a message carefully, they use systematic processing; otherwise they process information by using heuristics, or ‘mental short-cuts’. This model competes with the elaboration–likelihood model and is a part of dual process theory. It focuses more on the perciever’s motives and goals than ELM.

Question 11

What is compliance?

Answer 11

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

Question 12

What is ingratiation?

Answer 12

Strategic attempt to get someone to like you in order to obtain compliance with a request.

Question 13

What is the reciprocity principle?

Answer 13

This is sometimes called the reciprocity norm, or ‘the law of doing unto others what they do to you’. It can refer to an attempt to gain compliance by first doing someone a favour, or to mutual aggression, or to mutual attraction.

Question 14

What are multiple requests?

Answer 14

Tactics for gaining compliance using a two-step procedure: the first request functions as a set-up for the second, real request.

Question 15

What is the foot-in-the-door tactic?

Answer 15

Multiple-request technique to gain compliance, in which the focal request is preceded by a smaller request that is bound to be accepted.

Question 16

What is the door-in-the-face tactic?

Answer 16

Multiple-request technique to gain compliance, in which the focal request is preceded by a larger request that is bound to be refused.

Question 17

What is the low-ball tactic?

Answer 17

Technique for inducing compliance in which a person who agrees to a request still feels committed after finding that there are hidden costs.

Question 18

What is mindlessness?

Answer 18

The 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.

Question 19

What is action research?

Answer 19

The simultaneous activities of undertaking social science research, involving participants in the process and addressing a social problem.

Question 20

What is the selective exposure hypothesis?

Answer 20

People tend to avoid potentially dissonant information.

Question 21

What is effort justification?

Answer 21

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

Question 22

What is induced compliance?

Answer 22

A special case of cognitive dissonance: inconsistency is experienced when a person is persuaded to behave in a way that is contrary to an attitude.

Question 23

What is post-decisional conflict?

Answer 23

The dissonance associated with behaving in a counter-attitudinal way. Dissonance can be reduced by bringing the attitude into line with the behaviour.

Question 24

What is self-affirmation theory?

Answer 24

The theory that people reduce the impact of threat to their self-concept by focusing on and affirming their competence in some other area.

Question 25

What is reactance?

Answer 25

Brehm's theory that people try to protect their freedom to act. When they perceive that this freedom has been curtailed, they will act to regain it.

Question 26

What is forewarning?

Answer 26

Advance knowledge that one is to be the target of a persuasion attempt. Forewarning often produces resistance to persuasion.

Question 27

What is inoculation?

Answer 27

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.

Question 28

What is the Hovland-Yale Model?

Answer 28

Model where persuasion is based on who is saying, what is being said and to what audience it is addressing. It affects attention, comprehension and acceptance of the information and can lead to a change

Question 29

What are the facets of the source (who) in the Hovland-Yale Model?

Answer 29

Expertise, likeability, trust worthiness and similarity to self

Question 30

What are the facets of the message (what) in the Hovland-Yale Model?

Answer 30

Both sides of the argument or one side, repetition of message and affective quality of the message

Question 31

What are the facets of the audience (whom) in the Hovland-Yale Model?

Answer 31

Their persuasibility, attention to the message, prior beliefs, self esteem and need for cognition/closure

Question 32

What is the need for cognition?

Answer 32

Personality variable indicating a person's chronic level of thoughtfulness in response to an external stimulus. High need for cognition corresponds to an individual who thinks a lot about new information

Question 33

What is the need for closure?

Answer 33

Personality variable describing an individual's desire for reducing ambiguity and arrive at clear conclusions. People with high need for closure would interpret ambiguous situation more in line with existing stereotypes/own ideas.

Question 34

When does dissonance lead to attitude change?

Answer 34

When people believe their behaviour is voluntary and can not ascribe the discrepancy between behaviour and attitude to external factors. Maybe due to self-perception of inferring own attitude to behaviour.

Question 35

What are techniques to increase resistance?

Answer 35

Forewarning and inoculation