Heuristic Processing Model Research Articles

Refusing to Tolerate Intolerance: An Experiment Testing the Link Between Exposure to Gay-Related Content and Resulting Attitudes and Behaviors

This article describes a 2 × 2 factorial design experiment with 334 undergraduates testing the influence of exposure to gay-related photographs on endorsement of tolerant gay attitudes and likelihood to interact with the photograph within a social media context. Individuals were more likely to interact with and be attitudinally influenced by pro-gay rather than anti-gay content. Prior media exposure to gay-related content was positively associated with likelihood to interact with the photographs. The experimental condition moderated this association. Our results provide support and extension for social cognitive theory, cultivation, and the heuristic processing model, as well as offer new information related to the study of social media, particularly those current conversational trends related to gay men and lesbians.

An experiment investigating the links among online dating profile attractiveness, ideal endorsement, and romantic media

This study was the first-ever experiment to test how ideal expressions in hypothetical online dating profiles and exposure to romantic media are related to profile attractiveness, romantic beliefs, and endorsement of ideal partner characteristics. The sample contained 249 undergraduate students from a small, southwestern university. The study is a one-way experiment, with five manipulations and one control group. Results revealed that exposure to the conditions featuring any ideal content produced stronger endorsement of romantic beliefs, but not ideal partner characteristics. Consuming romantic media predicted stronger endorsement of romantic beliefs and higher ratings of profile attractiveness. Results support the heuristic processing model of cultivation.

Beyond Cultivation: Exploring the Effects of Frequency, Recency, and Vivid Autobiographical Memories for Violent Media

Using Shrum's (1996) heuristic processing model as an explanatory mechanism, we propose that people who hold vivid autobiographical memories for a specific past experience with media violence will overstate the prevalence of real-world crime versus individuals without vivid memories. We also explore the effects of frequency and recency on social reality beliefs. A survey was administered to 207 undergraduate students who were asked to recall one violent television program or movie seen in the past. Participants were asked to write essays describing the violence, which were coded for vividness. Results support not only cultivation theory, but also the effects of memory vividness: participants with more vivid memories of blood and gore gave higher prevalence estimates of real-world crime and violence than participants with less vivid memories. Findings also suggest that females had more vivid memories for prior media violence than males. Implications for cultivation, the heuristic processing model, and vividness research are discussed.

Always on My Mind: Exploring How Frequent, Recent, and Vivid Television Portrayals Are Used in the Formation of Social Reality Judgments

Prior research has found consistent support for the heuristic processing model of cultivation effects, which argues that cultivation effects can be explained by the availability heuristic. The present study represents an experimental test of the heuristic processing model and tests the impact of frequency, recency, and vividness on construct accessibility and social reality beliefs. 213 students participated in a 2 × 2 × 2 prolonged exposure experimental design varying the frequency of exposure to violent television programs, the level of vividness in the programs, and recency of exposure. Dependent measures were accessibility and social reality beliefs. Results showed that reaction times were largely unresponsive to the independent variables. Although there were no main effects for frequency on social reality beliefs, there was a significant interaction between frequency and vividness on beliefs: People watching vivid violent media gave higher estimates of the prevalence of crime and police immorality in the real world in the 3× viewing condition than those in the 1× viewing condition. In concluding, it is argued that this study has important implications for the heuristic processing model, cultivation theory, and research into vividness effects.

Neural Network Simulations Support Heuristic Processing Model of Cultivation Effects

Many studies have shown that heavy TV viewers make social reality judgments more in line with televised reality. Shrum's (2001) heuristic model of cultivation effects predicted and found that biases in first-order cultivation judgments resemble heuristic processing. Systematic processing eliminated the effect. This study presents a series of computational simulations to examine whether a simple feed-forward neural network model exhibits learning behavior in accordance with Shrum's model. The data from the model are tested in contrast to data from human participants. Results closely fit human data. Simulations show that increased television exposure increases construct accessibility; television exemplars are not discounted when exhibiting the cultivation effect; and systematic processing reduces or eliminates the cultivation effect.

Processing strategy moderates the cultivation effect

This study tested the hypothesis that processing strategy moderates the effect of television viewing on social perceptions (cultivation effect). One hundred twenty-two male and female students provided estimates of the prevalence of crime, occupations, affluence, and marital discord under one of three conditions. Some participants were induced to process heuristically (heuristic group) through instructions to provide their estimates spontaneously with little elaboration. Other participants were induced to process systematically (systematic group) through an accuracy motivation/task importance manipulation. A third (control) group received instructions to simply answer the questions. The results indicated that processing strategy moderated the cultivation effect such that cultivation effects were noted in the heuristic and control groups but not in the systematic group. These results are consistent with the notion that the cultivation effect can be explained in part as the result of heuristic processing through lack of source discounting, and they provide support for the heuristic processing model of cultivation effects.

Television Exposure, Perceived Realism, and Exemplar Accessibility in the Social Judgment Process

This article explores the role of exemplar accessibility in Shrum's (1996) heuristic processing model of cultivation effects. Specifically, the study tested whether television exposure and perceived realism of television would predict the accessibility of examples of constructs frequently portrayed on television. Participants (197) completed a survey measuring television exposure, perceived realism of television, and demographics. Six weeks later they were divided into two experimental conditions. Condition 1 participants answered social judgment questions and then performed an exemplar accessibility task. Condition 2 participants performed the exemplar accessibility task then made social judgments. As predicted by the model, participants who answered social judgment questions first exhibited a cultivation effect. Those who performed the exemplar accessibility task first did not. Also, measures of perceived realism of television predicted accessibility of examples (Black doctors, shootings, and extramarital affairs). Mere exposure to television did not predict the accessibility of examples as predicted. Results suggest that perceived realism of television content may play a role in the heuristic process linking television exposure and social judgments. Limitations are discussed, and suggestions for future research are offered.

Consumer Product Warnings: Effects of Injury Statistics on Recall and Subjective Evaluations

Research has shown that explicitly worded warnings are judged to be more effective than similar warnings lacking explicitness. One possible way of increasing warning explicitness is to include injury outcome statistics in the warning statement. The heuristic processing model of persuasion would postulate that the impact of persuasive messages, like warnings, is influenced by heuristic cues such as the number and length of arguments and the presence of statistics. This research investigated the effect of embedding injury outcome statistics in the safety instructions for electric power tools. Warning statement recall and various rating judgments were measured. Results showed that the presence of statistics led to greater recall and higher ratings of warning importance, vividness, and explicitness. Implications for the design of consumer product warnings are discussed.

The Effects of Television Consumption on Social Perceptions: The Use of Priming Procedures to Investigate Psychological Processes

Two studies investigated the extent to which heavy television viewing affects consumers' perceptions of social reality and the cognitive processes that underlie these effects. Both studies found evidence that heavy viewers' beliefs about social reality are more consistent with the content of television programming than are those of light viewers. The use of a priming methodology provided support for the notion that television is a causal factor in the formation of these beliefs and that a failure to discount television-based exemplars in forming these beliefs accounts for its influence. Implications of these results for a heuristic processing model of television effects are discussed.

The Role of Source Confusion in Cultivation Effects May Depend on Processing Strategy A Comment on Mares (1996)

Mares (1996) presented evidence that source confusions play a role in the cultivation effect. In doing so, she suggested that these findings are at odds with assertions made by Shrum and O'Guinn (1993) concerning the lack of attention that people pay to source characteristics when constructing their social reality judgments. The purpose of this comment is to clarify some of the findings of Mares (1996) that have implications for the heuristic model of cultivation effects (Shrum, 1995) and to show that Mares's findings are, in fact, fully compatible with, and can be integrated into, the heuristic processing model. Implications of Mares's findings for refining and extending Ms model are also discussed.