Misrecall of Pre-Manipulation Opinion: Repression or Recency Effect?

Abstract

The misrecall of pre-manipulation opinion is a phenomenon subject to either an explanation based on motivational defensive repression or one of non-motivational self-attribution. A before-after study of persuasive communication was conducted in which all participants completed measures of defensiveness, repression, and self-racing of independence. On the basis of an hypothesis of defensive repression it was predicted that opinion changers who mistakenly report their prior opinion as close to or identical with their final opinion would score significantly higher on measures of defensiveness and repression and would rate themselves as more independent than opinion changers who correctly recall their initial opinion. None of these predicted differences occurred. The results constitute an operational disconfirmation of the defensive repression hypothesis. However, a conceptual disconfirmation of the hypothesis may require a more precise formulation of the “self-esteem theory” set of ideas from which the present hypothesis of defensive repression was derived. It is suggested that the attempt to develop such a formulation and attempts to answer the general question of the importance of ego-defensiveness might appropriately be launched from the perspective of functional theories of attitudes and belief systems.