It's the Product: Do Risky Products Compel Attention and Elicit Arousal in Media Users?

Abstract

This article reports on two studies designed to measure whether the mere presence of a risky product in a mediated message (separate from executional elements of the message) elicits greater attention and arousal in media users. In the first study, participants viewed and rated 30 pictures of risky (alcohol, tobacco, drugs, condoms) and nonrisky (soda, juice, food) products while heart rate and skin conductance were measured. In the second study, participants viewed and rated 30 risky and nonrisky product words while the same measures were recorded. Results showed that the risky pictures and words elicited more emotional and physiological arousal than nonrisky pictures and words. Risky pictures elicited different orienting responses than nonrisky pictures, but there was no difference in orienting for risky and nonrisky words. Both risky pictures and words were remembered better than nonrisky pictures and words. The results of this study suggest that the mere presence of the representation of a risky product (either pictorial or verbal) elicits more arousal and more memory but not more attention in media users.

Experimental evaluation of antitobacco PSAs: Effects of message content and format on physiological and behavioral outcomes

“…Research has demonstrated the utility of physiological responses in understanding message processing and recall ( Lang, Chung, Lee, Shin, & Schwartz 2005 ;Palmgreen et al, 2001 ). Physiological responses may be less informative in characterizing effective messages in an older, smoking population such as ours, than in younger subjects viewing illicit drug content media ( Lang, Chung, Lee, & Zhao, 2005 ;Palmgreen et al, 2001 ). Further research is needed.…”

“…It is possible that the MSV manipulation in the present study was less salient than that used in prior research, in part because of the smoking cessation theme. Alternatively, adolescents may be more sensitive to MSV manipulations ( Lang, Chung, Lee, & Zhao, 2005 ;Palmgreen et al, 2001 ) than are adult populations.…”

“…MSV ratings take into account the following three components: (a) a visual component, which rates the presence of cuts and edits, special visual effects, and intense images; (b) an audio component, which rates sound saturation (e.g., ambient conversation or street-level noise), and the presence of music and sound effects; and (c) a content component, which rates the presence of action images, unexpected format, and surprise endings ( Morgan et al, 2003 ). These message features have been shown to affect attention to messages ( Lang, Chung, Lee, & Zhao, 2005 ) and physiological responses associated with arousal (i.e., skin conductance and heart rate; Lang, Schwartz, Chung, & Lee, 2004 ).…”

For they know not what they do? Target memory and metacognitive monitoring of self-disclosures on social networking sites

“…Furthermore, there is evidence from the FtF context that message risk cues are associated with better memory in general. In an exemplary study in the context of health communication, participants showed enhanced physiological arousal and also better memory for risky pictures or words (Lang, Chung, Lee, & Zhao, 2005). Thus, we predicted that SNS users' target memory (Hypothesis 2b/H2b; for details see 5) and their metacognitive monitoring (Hypothesis 4b/H4b; for details see 5) should improve under risk conditions of personal information (compared to less risky conditions of impersonal information).…”

Erasing the Stigma: Where Science Meets Advocacy

“…Electromyography and heart rate are the most common approaches for assessing psycho-physiological reactivity to research stimuli. Researchers have adapted these models for understanding media effects on research participants and found that psycho-physiological reactions increase in a manner consistent with activation when viewing PSAs (Lang, Chung, Lee, Schwartz, & Shim, 2005;Lang, Chung, Lee, & Zhao, 2005). This kind of technology was incorporated into the Indiana evaluation of What a Difference although analyses of these data had not been completed when this article was authored (B.…”