Fabien Girandola

Cross-Cultural Investigation of Compliance Without Pressure The “You Are Free to. . .” Technique in France, Ivory Coast, Romania, Russia, and China

Compliance-without-pressure techniques have been widely studied in North America and West Europe. Among these techniques, the “but you are free” (BYAF) is a verbal compliance procedure that solicits someone to comply with a request by simply telling a person that he or she is free to accept or refuse the request. This technique is interpreted with the commitment theory and the psychological reactance theory which are more relevant in individualistic cultures than in collectivist cultures. So, four studies compared the efficiency of the BYAF technique in collectivist cultures (Ivory Coast, Russia, and China) and in individualist cultures (France and Romania). As suggested in the hypothesis, our analysis indicated that the BYAF technique will be much less successful in more collectivist cultures. Such results underline the importance of considering specific cultural contexts in social influence studies.

Revealing the elusive effects of vividness: a meta-analysis of empirical evidences assessing the effect of vividness on persuasion

Abstract Despites decades of research, past studies focusing on the effects of vividness on persuasion found mixed and contradictory results. In order to solve this conflicting issue, a meta-analysis was conducted on empirical studies assessing the impact of vivid (vs. pallid) communications on attitude and/or behavioral intention. Overall, 27 articles (k = 43; N = 7575) were included. Our results showed that vividness yielded significant small-to-medium effect on both attitude (d+ = .31) and behavioral intention (d+ = .39). Furthermore, meta-regression analyses indicated that memory recall, cognitive elaboration, and topic valence moderated these effects, whereas vividness/argument congruency was not significantly related to the variations of effects sizes. Finally, theoretical implications of theses finding will be discussed.

When Commitment Can Be Overturned Anticipating Recycling Program Dropouts Through Social Representations

Evidence from past pro-environmental programs suggests that the invalidation of individuals’ expectations could lead them to drop out of a given program. The aim of this research is to evaluate the impact of the invalidation of expectations on individuals’ commitment to a waste-sorting program. We focused on the hierarchy that may exist among these expectations by drawing on the dichotomy between central and peripheral cognitions proposed within the framework of the theory of social representations. In this perspective, expectations are the result of a body of socially constructed knowledge and can be characterized either by a central (essential) or peripheral (non-essential) status. Results show that withdrawing from the program is significantly more frequent when the experimenter invalidates a central cognition than when he invalidates a peripheral one. This moderating effect highlights the importance of taking into account representations with a view to explaining or preventing withdrawal from pro-environmental programs.

Self-affirmation and an incongruent drinking norm: alcohol abuse prevention messages targeting young people

Abstract Many health campaigns are designed to reduce dangerous binge drinking by challenging the drinking perceived norm. Both information about health risks and statements that only a few people binge drink (descriptive norm) threaten self-integrity for individuals targeted. So, to combat this self-threat and preserve their positive self-integrity, drinkers discredit the message as a coping strategy. An alternative to the coping strategy is a procedure of self-affirmation to protect self-integrity. Across three experiments, we found that self-affirmation does indeed reduce (Experiment 1) or delete (Experiments 2 and 3) discrediting, but only provided that there is no normative information in the health message. Individuals continued to use the discrediting strategy despite the fact that the participants were self-affirmed when they are told that few people binge drink among their age group. The theoretical implications for self-affirmation are discussed.

Faire « appel à la peur » pour persuader ? Revue de la littérature et perspectives de recherche

Resume De nombreux professionnels de la sante diffusent des messages preventifs concus de maniere a effrayer ou choquer. L’objectif est de faire « appel a la peur » afin d’avertir des dangers que les individus peuvent encourir en adoptant certains comportements et de les amener a realiser des actions plus adaptees. Est-ce une strategie efficace et quels sont ses effets ? Depuis plus d’une soixantaine d’annees, la recherche sur les appels a la peur a conduit de nombreux travaux et propose differents modeles theoriques (Girandola, 2000). Cet article presente ces recherches. Nous reviendrons d’abord sur une revue des principaux modeles avant de presenter les recherches les plus recentes (1998–2014) orientees vers les processus cognitifs lies au traitement de l’information. Des pistes de recherches, ainsi qu’une nouvelle modelisation seront finalement evoquees et discutees.

The Pique Then Reframe Technique: Replication and Extension of the Pique Technique

This study examined the pique technique associated with a reframing sentence. Passersby in the street were asked for money, either for a common amount of change (control) or 37 cents (pique technique). In half of the cases, the requester added a direct reframing sentence at the end of the request. Results showed that the pique technique increased compliance with the request. Adding a reframing sentence to the pique did not increase compliance rate with the request but increased the amount of money given by the participants. These results support the theoretical explanation that a reframing sentence could reduce the influence of the script of refusal activated by the money request.

Social Representations and Commitment

This contribution consists of a critical review of the literature about the articulation of two traditionally separated theoretical fields: social representations and commitment. Besides consulting various works and communications, a bibliographic search was carried out (between February and December, 2016) on various databases using the keywords “commitment” and “social representation,” in the singular and in the plural, in French and in English. Articles published in English or in French, that explicitly made reference to both terms, were included. The relations between commitment and social representations are approached according to two approaches or complementary lines. The first line follows the role of commitment in the representational dynamics: how can commitment transform the representations? This articulation gathers most of the work on the topic. The second line envisages the social representations as determinants of commitment procedures: how can these representations influence the effects of commitment procedures? This literature review will identify unexploited tracks, as well as research perspectives for both areas of research.

Priming Resistance to Persuasion decreases adherence to Conspiracy Theories

Abstract Research in the field of Resistance to Persuasion (RP) has demonstrated that inoculating individuals with counter arguments is effective for lowering their levels of adherence to conspiracist beliefs (CB). Yet, this strategy is limited because it requires specific arguments tailored against targeted conspiracist narratives. Therefore, we investigated whether priming Resistance to Persuasion would reduce individual adherence to CB among undergraduate student samples. A first study (N = 81) demonstrated that participants primed by filling a RP scale had lower CB scores than control participants. This effect was directly replicated twice (N = 205 and N = 265) and confirmed by a mini meta-analysis (N = 519; d = .20). Practical and theoretical implications are then discussed.

Social Influence and Intercultural Differences

Culture is an important part of what individuals are and can orient their attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors in several contexts. In equivalent situations, people would be likely to report different reactions depending on their cultural background. The effects of cross-cultural differences (individualistic vs. collectivistic cultures) on cognitive dissonance, social influence, and persuasion are discussed. This chapter shows that intra-individual processes, such as reduction dissonance and the processing of persuasive information, are regulated by cultural orientations and cultural aspects of the self (independent vs. interdependent self-construal). Considering these cross-cultural effects, new avenues of research open up on change and resistance to change in many fields such as health, environment, consumption, and radicalization.

Are Vivid (Vs. Pallid) Threats Persuasive? Examining the Effects of Threat Vividness in Health Communications

ABSTRACT To encourage the adoption of protective recommendations, health communications often include vivid information depicting the features of relevant threats. Despite a large body of research on threatening communications, little attention has been yet given to threat vividness. Across three experiments, we thus tested whether including a vivid (vs. pallid) threat in a health communication affects the acceptance of recommendations. Results revealed greater responses when people were exposed to a vivid threat, relative to a pallid threat. However, we also demonstrated that such beneficial effects were dependent on threat severity and vulnerability to the threat. Taken together, these findings underscore the importance of distinguishing the effects of the threat from those of its vividness.