Investigating the social-adjustive and value-expressive functions of attitudes: Implications for persuasion processes.

Abstract

In Study 1, individuals for whom attitudes serve a primarily social-adjustive function (i.e., highself-monitoring individuals) and individuals for whom attitudes serve a primarily value-expressive function (i.e., low-self-monitoring individuals) were identified. As expected, high-self-monitoring individuals experienced more attitude change after exposure to a message said to address a socialadjustive function, and low-self-monitoring individuals experienced more attitude change after listening to a message presumably directed at a value-expressive function. Moreover, subjects tended to generate proportionally more message-relevant thoughts in response to, and tended to recall better, functionally relevant messages. In addition, recall tended to be particularly consistent with post message attitudes when the message was functionally relevant. A second study suggested that the attitude change obtained in Study 1 occurred via peripheral route processes. Results are discussed in terms of the usefulness of adopting a functional approach and its implications for persuasion, information processing, and memory for attitudinally relevant information. Additionally, methods for studying attitudinal functions are discussed. This article is based on a doctoral dissertation submitted to the graduate school of the University of Minnesota.I would like to thank Eugene Borgida. Mark Snyder, and three anonymous reviewers for their comments on an earlier version of this article, and Shirley DeBono and Allen M. Omoto for their assistance in the design of this study. Many thanks also go to Candace and Tamara Polin and Rick Hamish for serving as experimenters and for coding data.

Motivations underlying attitudes: regulatory focus and majority versus minority support

“…Indeed, previous research has consistently shown that persuasive arguments have a greater impact when they target a recipient's chronic or temporary motivations (e.g. DeBono, 1987;DeBono & Harnish, 1988;Lavine & Snyder, 1996;Petty & Wegener, 1998;Prentice, 1987;Shavitt, 1990). Furthermore, previous research has also shown that persuasive communications benefit from matching their targets' regulatory focus (e.g.…”

Getting at the truth or getting along: Accuracy- versus impression-motivated heuristic and systematic processing.

“…Given the motivational nature of the construct (Snyder, 1987) and evidence for differences in the attitudinal expression (DeBono, 1987;Snyder & DeBono, 1985) and interaction styles (Ickes & Barnes, 1977) of high versus low self-monitors, use of this individual difference seemed appropriate. High self-monitors' concerns with the social implications of their attitudes and behavior directly correspond to the impression-motivated focus on the social consequences of expressed judgments.…”

Enhancing the effectiveness of tobacco package warning labels: a social psychological perspective

“…39 40 The concept of attitude function has been studied in relation to attitudes towards victims of AIDS, 41 attitudes towards homosexuals, 42 attitudes towards automobiles, 43 44 and attitudes towards advertising of consumer products. [45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52] As applied to smoking, this suggests that it is not only useful to know that the target group has positive attitudes towards smoking, but also to be aware of why that group has positive attitudes towards smoking. An adolescent may hold positive attitudes towards smoking because she wishes to fit in with her peers, to keep her body weight low, or because she enjoys the physiological effects of smoking.…”