Effect of fear-arousing communications.

Abstract

IT is generally recognized that when beliefs and attitudes are modified, learning processes are involved in which motivational factors play a primary role. Symbols in mass communications can be manipulated in a variety of ways so as to arouse socially acquired motives such as need for achievement, group conformity, power-seeking, and the more emotion-laden drives arising from aggression, sympathy, guilt, and anxiety. The present experiment was designed to study the effects of one particular type of motive-incentive variable in persuasive communications, namely, the arousal of fear or anxiety by depicting potential dangers to which the audience might be exposed. Fear appeals of this sort are frequently used to influence attitudes and behavior. For example, medical authorities sometimes try to persuade people to visit cancer detection clinics by pointing to the dangerous consequences of failing to detect the early symptoms of cancer; various political groups play up the threat of war or totalitarianism in an attempt to motivate adherence to their political program. Our interest in such attempts is primarily that of determining the conditions under which the arousal of fear is effective or ineffective in eliciting changes in beliefs, practices, and attitudes. Implicit in the use of fear appeals is the assumption that when emotional tension is aroused, the audience will become more highly motivated to accept the reassuring beliefs or recommendations advocated by the 1 This study was conducted at Yale University as part of a coordinated program of research on attitude and opinion change, financed by a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation. The attitude change research project is under the general direction of Professor Carl I. Hovland, to whom the authors wish to express their appreciation for many valuable suggestions concerning the design of the experiment. Special thanks are due to Dr. Isador Hirschfeld of New York City and Dr. Bert G. Anderson of the Yale Medical School for their helpful advice in connection with the preparation of the illustrated talks on dental hygiene. The authors also wish to thank Dr. S. Willard Price, Superintendent of Schools at Greenwich, Connecticut, and Mr. Andrew Bella, Principal of the Greenwich High School, for their generous cooperation.