H. Hoeken

Identification as a Mechanism of Narrative Persuasion

To provide a causal test of identification as a mechanism of narrative persuasion, this study uses the perspective from which a story is told to manipulate identification experimentally and test effects on attitudes. In experiment 1, 120 participants read a story that was told either from the perspective of one character or another character, with both characters having opposing goals. Results showed that perspective influenced identification and story consistency of attitudes. Moreover, identification with one of the characters mediated the effect of perspective on attitudes. In experiment 2, 200 participants read a different story that was told from one of two perspectives, with both characters having opposing opinions. Results showed that identification with both characters mediated the effect of perspective on attitudes. The results of these experiments indicate that identification can be a mechanism of narrative persuasion.

Suspense, curiosity, and surprise: How discourse structure influences the affective and cognitive processing of a story☆

Abstract The structural affect theory (Brewer and Lichtenstein, 1982) states that different affective responses can be evoked by manipulating the order in which a storys events are narrated. Suspense is evoked by postponing the storys outcome, curiosity is evoked by presenting the outcome before the preceding events, and surprise is evoked by an unexpected event. Apart from evoking different affective responses, the manipulation of the event order can influence the cognitive processing as well. In this paper, an experiment is described in which the affective and cognitive effects of suspense, curiosity, and surprise structures are studied using a story by a professional author. The results showed that suspense can be evoked even when readers know how the story will end. The inclusion of a surprising event is highly appreciated. Furthermore, it leads to a better representation of the storys events, as was predicted by Kintsch (1980).

Anecdotal, Statistical, and Causal Evidence: Their Perceived and Actual Persuasiveness

Claims about the occurrence of future events play an important role in pragmatic argumentation. Such claims can be supported by inductive arguments employing anecdotal, statistical, or causal evidence. In an experiment, the actual and perceived persuasiveness of these three types of evidence were assessed. A total of 324 participants read a newspaper article in which it was claimed that the building of a cultural centre would be profitable. This claim was supported by either anecdotal, statistical or causal evidence. The statistical evidence proved to be more convincing than the anecdotal and causal evidence. Although the latter two evidence types were equally unconvincing, the anecdotal evidence was perceived as less persuasive than the causal evidence. Therefore, the actual and perceived persuasiveness of the evidence did not correspond. These results partly replicate the results obtained in previous experiments. They also underscore the need to distinguish between the perceived and the actual persuasiveness of an argument.

Cultural Differences in the Persuasiveness of Evidence Types and Evidence Quality

Cultural differences in reasoning and persuasion have mainly been documented for the East—West divide. Nisbett (2003) expects such differences to be absent for Western cultures because of their shared Grecian inheritance. The results of two experiments, however, show that France and The Netherlands, both Western European countries, differ with respect to the persuasiveness of different evidence types. In Study 1 (N=600), cultural differences occurred between the relative persuasiveness of anecdotal, statistical, causal, and expert evidence. In Study 2 (N=600), the quality of statistical and expert evidence was manipulated. For the Dutch, but not for the French, normatively strong evidence was more persuasive than normatively weak evidence for both evidence types. Implications and possible explanations are discussed.

International Advertising in Western Europe: Should Differences in Uncertainty Avoidance Be Considered When Advertising in Belgium, France, the Netherlands and Spain?

There is an ongoing debate as to whether cultural differences necessi tate adaptation of advertisements to local circumstances in interna tional business communication. In particular, value appeals are thought to be culturally sensitive because cultures differ with respect to which values are considered important, and it is thought that appealing to important values is more persuasive than appealing to ones less impor tant. This article reports on an experiment in which the persuasiveness of an appeal to security was compared to that of an appeal to adven ture. The relative persuasiveness of these appeals was studied in coun tries (i.e., Belgium, France and Spain) that are characterized as high uncertainty avoidance cultures, and a country characterized as a low uncertainty avoidance culture: The Netherlands. Results showed that the two value appeals proved equally persuasive for all countries.

The influence of negative newspaper publicity on corporate image in the Netherlands

Due to a new press policy, the Dutch equivalent of the District Attorneys office actively spreads information about its suspicions of illegal behavior. Newspa pers, which are still a dominant form of news in the Netherlands, publish these suspicions. This will probably harm the suspected persons or companys image. This study addresses three questions. First, how severe is the damage caused by negative publicity in a Dutch regional daily? Second, are Dutch newspaper readers sensitive to the tone of certainty with which the accusations are expressed? Third, how lasting are any of these effects? In a field experiment, 448 readers of regional dailies, differing widely in age and education level, read either an actually published newspaper article on a possible bribery scandal, a more objective rewrite of this article, or some neutral information on the com pany s activities. Results show that the corporate image was seriously damaged by negative publicity. The more categorical the accusations were, the more damage there was. More than two weeks after reading the article, damage to the image was still present.

Arguing about desirable consequences: what constitutes a convincing argument?

Argument quality has consistently been shown to have strong and lasting persuasive effects. The question is what criteria people use to distinguish strong from weak arguments and how these criteria relate to the ones proposed in normative argumentation theory. In an experiment 235 participants without training in argumentation theory rated the acceptance of 30 claims about the desirability of a consequence that were supported by either an argument from analogy, from authority, or from consequences. The supporting arguments were systematically manipulated to violate argument type specific criteria. Participants proved sensitive to the violation of most, but not all, argument type specific criteria. From a normative perspective these findings suggest that people act in a fairly adequate way. These findings also enable a more precise description of what people may do when critically appraising arguments, which has important implications for the use of argument quality as a methodological tool in persuasion research.

“May I have your attention?”;: Exordial techniques in informative oral presentations

An introduction, even a short one, makes audiences more willing to listen to a speech, think more highly of the speaker, and understand a speech better than when no introduction is given. Two experiments at Delft University of Technology support this conclusion. Subjects viewed videotapes of professional presentations on the topic of Sick Building Syndrome. In one experiment, subjects rated the effectiveness of three introductory or “exordial”; techniques in gaining audience attention: an anecdote, an ethical appeal, and a “your problem”; approach. Results indicate that audiences do respond to exordial techniques, and in a predictable manner. In the second experiment, two speeches with anecdotal openers were tested against one without any introduction. The anecdotes led to significantly higher ratings of the presentations comprehensibility and interest, as well as the speakers credibility. The presence of an anecdote also resulted in higher retention scores. Oddly enough, the relevance of the anecdote d...

Targeting implicit approach reactions to snack food in children: Effects on intake

OBJECTIVE Implicit approach reactions to energy-dense snack food can facilitate unhealthy eating in children. Therefore, an experiment was conducted to test whether modifying implicit reactions to snack food by means of a go/no-go task can reduce consumption of this food. The effectiveness of this intervention on actual snack intake after exposure to a food or a control advertisement was tested. METHOD Children (133; age range = 7-10 years) played an advergame promoting either energy-dense food or nonfood products. Subsequently, children conducted either a go/no-go food task in which the advertised food was consistently associated with no-go cues, or a go/no-go control task in which colored circles were consistently associated with no-go cues. Afterward, they could eat the advertised food and a new food. Candy intake was weighed and caloric intake was determined. RESULTS Results show that children who performed the go/no-go food task consumed significantly and considerably fewer calories (34%) than the children who carried out the control task. No main effect of type of advertisement was found. Furthermore, the effect of the go/no-go food task was similar after each type of advertisement, similar for advertised and new foods, and was significant for both girls and boys. CONCLUSION Targeting implicit reactions to high-energy snacks proved effective in decreasing intake of snacks in children. Furthermore, the previously reported stimulating effect of food promoting advergames on intake may disappear when a short cognitive task is presented directly after the game. Future work should evaluate the clinical implications of these findings. (PsycINFO Database Record

The Impact of Exemplars on Responsibility Stereotypes in Fund-Raising Letters:

Exemplars are capable of influencing perceptions of reality in newspaper contexts. Can exemplars in fund-raising letters also influence the responsibility stereotype of the group funds are raised for and the effectiveness of these letters? In three experiments, 679 participants received a fund-raising letter containing an exemplar that was or was not held responsible for the trouble he or she was in. In all experiments, the responsibility perception of the group as a whole was influenced by the exemplar manipulation. If the group members were held responsible for the trouble they were in, participants were less inclined to donate money unless the trouble was considered very severe. The study shows how exemplars influence responsibility stereotypes and the persuasiveness of fund-raising letters.