WHAT FOLLOWS AFTER FAILURE OF PERSUASION

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine the communicator's attitude change induced by negative feed-back in a mutual influece setting. Fifty-eight male and female undergraduates served as Ss in this experiment and ran through it in a group of 4 of 6 persons. Commitment to persuasion attempt was varied by manipulating the amount of efforts to make the persuasive essay (writting and selecting). And discrepancies in attitudinal positions on the topic (necessity of the participation in student clubs) between Ss and their bogue partners were adjusted by manipulating the extent (large and small) of the partner's negative feedback to communicators. Before-after design was used to measure Ss' attitude changes.The results were as follows.1. There Was reverse relationship between ego-involvement and the boomerang effect.2. The same relationship was also found between commitment and the boomerang effect.3. There was positive and monotonic relationship between discrepancy-size and the boomerang effect.Thus, under the large discrepancy conditions, when Ss were low-involved in the issue and not so committed to persuade their partners, they showed the greatest boomerang effect. On the contrary, highly involved Ss being given a small discrepancy under low commitment conditions showed little boomerang effect. Rather, they showed the change toward the partner's attitudinal positions.The implication of the results was discussed in the view of the interactive effect of responseinvolvement, discrepancy-size, and a compartmentalization effect of commitment.