Message Exposure Research Articles

Assessing the Potential Effectiveness of Pictorial Messages to Deter Young Women from Indoor Tanning: An Experimental Study

The recent Surgeon General’s call-to-action to prevent skin cancer indicates an urgent need for research on messages to deter young women from tanning indoors. Answering this call, the current study assessed differences in the potential effectiveness of pictorial indoor tanning messages. We randomly assigned undergraduate female participants (N = 568) to one of three message conditions visually depicting health effects, appearance damage, or immediate risks, or to a text-only control. All participants viewed three messages within their condition and answered questions after message exposure. Factorial ANOVAs indicated that compared to the text-only condition, pictorial messages produced greater negative emotional reactions and were perceived as more effective than text-only messages. Text-only messages, however, were significantly more believable than pictorial messages. We observed several differences among the pictorial conditions and among the messages within the pictorial conditions. We conclude that messages discouraging indoor tanning should use pictorial messages illustrating the negative health and appearance damaging effects of indoor tanning, focusing on particular health and appearance consequences. Additional research is needed to guide the selection of images that are believable and will most discourage indoor tanning behavior.

Effects of tailoring ingredients in auditory persuasive health messages on fruit and vegetable intake

Objective: Health messages can be tailored by applying different tailoring ingredients, among which personalisation, feedback and adaptation. This experiment investigated the separate effects of these tailoring ingredients on behaviour in auditory health persuasion. Furthermore, the moderating effect of self-efficacy was assessed.Design: The between-participants design consisted of four conditions. A generic health message served as a control condition; personalisation was applied using the recipient’s first name, feedback was given on the personal state, or the message was adapted to the recipient’s value.Main outcome measures: The study consisted of a pre-test questionnaire (measuring fruit and vegetable intake and perceived difficulty of performing these behaviours, indicating self-efficacy), exposure to the auditory message and a follow-up questionnaire measuring fruit and vegetable intake two weeks after message exposure (n = 112).Results: ANCOVAs showed no main effect of condition on either fruit or vegetable intake, but a moderation was found on vegetable intake: When self-efficacy was low, vegetable intake was higher after listening to the personalisation message. No significant differences between the conditions were found when self-efficacy was high.Conclusion: Individuals with low self-efficacy seemed to benefit from incorporating personalisation, but only regarding vegetable consumption. This finding warrants further investigation in tailoring research.

Influence of consumers’ brand expectations on apparel brands’ US-based sourcing strategy

PurposeThis study aims to understand how consumers evaluate Made in USA messages that are congruent/incongruent to consumers’ prior expectations about the brand’s US-based sourcing initiatives.Design/methodology/approachTwo separate studies were conducted. Online experiment was designed implementing both message and treatment variance to increase internal and external validity of the study. Data collected from two distinct samples were analyzed using MANOVA and ANOVA.FindingsFindings from Study 1 indicated that consumers’ perceived message credibility, attitude toward message and attitude toward brand were highest for congruent messages, followed by when incongruity was resolved and lowest when incongruity was not resolved. Further, consumers’ brand attitudes before and after message exposure were different, with change being most positive for incongruity resolution, followed by congruity, whereas negative for incongruity non-resolution. Findings from Study 2 indicated that consumers’ general attitude toward brands’ US-based sourcing strategies influenced their brand attitude, as well as moderated the relation between schema congruity/incongruity resolution/incongruity non-resolution and brand attitude.Originality/valueThe findings are helpful for brand managers and sourcing personnel to better invest their resources in US-based sourcing strategies. In addition, the findings of the study contribute and extend theory by identifying a boundary condition.

How Does Treatment Self-Selection Affect Inferences About Political Communication?

AbstractEcological validity is vital to experimental research because designs that are too artificial may not speak to any real-world political phenomenon. One such concern is treatment of self-selection: if individuals in the real-world self-select treatments, such as political communications, how well does the sample average treatment effect estimate the effects of message exposure for those individuals who would—if given the choice—opt-in to and out of receiving treatment? This study shows that randomization masks effect heterogeneity between individuals who would select different messages if given the choice. Yet, such selections are themselves complex, revealing additional challenges for realistically studying treatments prone to self-selection. The evidence of effect heterogeneity raises questions about the appropriateness of random assignment experiments for studying political communication and the results more broadly advance our understanding of citizens’ selection into and responses to communications when, as they often do, have choice over what messages to receive.

Design and Feasibility of a Text Messaging Intervention to Prevent Indoor Tanning Among Young Adult Women: A Pilot Study.

BackgroundAlthough skin cancer is largely preventable, it affects nearly 1 of 5 US adults. There is a need for research on how to optimally design persuasive public health indoor tanning prevention messages.ObjectiveThe objective of our study was to examine whether framed messages on indoor tanning behavioral intentions delivered through short message service (SMS) text messaging would produce (1) positive responses to the messages, including message receptivity and emotional response; (2) indoor tanning efficacy beliefs, including response efficacy and self-efficacy; and (3) indoor tanning risk beliefs.MethodsWe conducted a pilot study of indoor tanning prevention messages delivered via mobile phone text messaging in a sample of 21 young adult women who indoor tan. Participants completed baseline measures, were randomly assigned to receive gain-, loss-, or balanced-framed text messages, and completed postexposure outcome measures on indoor tanning cognitions and behaviors. Participants received daily mobile phone indoor tanning prevention text messages for 1 week and completed the same postexposure measures as at baseline.ResultsOver the 1-week period there were trends or significant changes after receipt of the text messages, including increased perceived susceptibility (P<.001), response efficacy beliefs (P<.001), and message receptivity (P=.03). Ordinary least squares stepwise linear regression models showed an effect of text message exposure on self-efficacy to quit indoor tanning (t6=–2.475, P<.02). Ordinary least squares linear regression including all measured scales showed a marginal effect of SMS texts on self-efficacy (t20=1.905, P=.08). Participants endorsed highly favorable views toward the text messaging protocol.ConclusionsThis study supports this use of mobile text messaging as an indoor tanning prevention strategy. Given the nature of skin cancer risk perceptions, the addition of multimedia messaging service is another area of potential innovation for disseminating indoor tanning prevention messages.

Media Messages and Perceptions of the Affordable Care Act during the Early Phase of Implementation.

Public opinion about the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has been polarized since the law's passage. Past research suggests these conditions would make any media influence on the public limited at best. However, during the early phase of implementation, locally broadcast ACA-related media messages-in the form of paid health insurance and political advertisements and news media stories-abounded as advocates, insurance marketers, and politicians sought to shape the public's perceptions of the law. To what extent did message exposure affect ACA perceptions during the first open enrollment period? We merge data on volumes of messaging at the media market level with nationally representative survey data to examine the relationship between estimated exposure to media messaging and the public's perceptions of how informed they were about and favorable toward the ACA in October 2013. We find that higher volumes of insurance advertising and local news coverage are associated with participants' perceptions of being informed about the law. Volumes of insurance advertising and of local news coverage are also associated with participants' favorability toward the law, but the relationship varies with partisanship, supporting the growing body of research describing partisan perceptual bias.

Modulating the neural bases of persuasion: why/how, gain/loss, and users/non-users.

Designing persuasive content is challenging, in part because people can be poor predictors of their actions. Medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) activation during message exposure reliably predicts downstream behavior, but past work has been largely atheoretical. We replicated past results on this relationship and tested two additional framing effects known to alter message receptivity. First, we examined gain- vs. loss-framed reasons for a health behavior (sunscreen use). Consistent with predictions from prospect theory, we observed greater MPFC activity to gain- vs. loss-framed messages, and this activity was associated with behavior. This relationship was stronger for those who were not previously sunscreen users. Second, building on theories of action planning, we compared neural activity during messages regarding how vs. why to enact the behavior. We observed rostral inferior parietal lobule and posterior inferior frontal gyrus activity during action planning (“how” messages), and this activity was associated with behavior; this is in contrast to the relationship between MPFC activity during the “why” (i.e., gain and loss) messages and behavior. These results reinforce that persuasion occurs in part via self-value integration—seeing value and incorporating persuasive messages into one's self-concept—and extend this work to demonstrate how message framing and action planning may influence this process.

The impact of behaviour change communication on the use of insecticide treated nets: a secondary analysis of ten post-campaign surveys from Nigeria.

BackgroundMass distribution campaigns of insecticide-treated nets for malaria prevention are usually accompanied by intensive behaviour change communication (BCC) to encourage hanging and use of nets. However, data on the effectiveness of these communication efforts are scarce. In preparation for the next round of mass campaigns in Nigeria, a secondary analysis of existing data from post-campaign surveys was undertaken to investigate the influence of BCC on net hanging and use.MethodsSurveys were undertaken between 2009 and 2012 in ten states in Nigeria using standardized questionnaires. Two-stage cluster sampling was used to select households in each study site. Outcomes were defined as the effects of BCC message exposure and recall on knowledge, attitudes, perception as well as intentions and actual use. From the univariable analysis, potential confounders and explanatory variables were identified and key effects explored in multivariable linear or logistic regression models; terms in the models were kept if they had a marginal significance with p < 0.2. To quantify the effects from BCC, a treatment effect model was used with an inverse-probability weight regression adjustment.ResultsMore than half of the respondents (58.4 %; 95 % CI 56.0, 60.7) had heard a message about net use or hanging during or after the distribution campaign, with media cited as the most common source of information. Attitude towards net use was positively linked to the number of messages recalled and was overall better in the northern study sites. The number of messages recalled was also the strongest predictor of knowledge (p < 0.001). All BCC outcomes showed a significant increase in net use, which was strongest for the confidence to take action regarding nets with an overall effect of 17 %-point increase of net use comparing poor and excellent confidence levels. Intention to use every night increased net use by 15 %-points and discussing net use in the family by 8 % points. All these effects were statistically significant (p < 0.001).ConclusionsMultichannel BCC campaigns as well as other media were effective in contributing to an increase in net culture, hanging and use, particularly by vulnerable groups.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12936-016-1463-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Sport gain-framed messages, possible selves, and their effects on adults’ interest, intentions, and decision to register in sport

This longitudinal randomised study compared gain-framed messages to a comparison condition for effects on intentions to do sport, requests for newsletters describing adult sport opportunities, and sport registration in middle-aged adults. An a posteriori objective was to determine whether greater effects resulted from a possible self-protocol paired with each condition, compared to gain-framed and comparison conditions alone. Analysis of covariance and regression analyses showed gain-framed messages positively influenced intentions, newsletter requests, and registration, with greatest results among participants elaborating upon hoped-for sport selves immediately after message exposure. Results suggest the utility of pairing gain-framed messages with a possible self protocol.

How Online Peer-to-Peer Conversation Shapes the Effects of a Message About Healthy Sleep.

Conversation about health messages and campaigns is common, and message-related conversations are increasingly recognized as a consequential factor in shaping message effects. The evidence base is limited, however, about the conditions under which conversation may help or hinder health communication efforts. In this study, college students (N = 301) first watched a short sleep video and were randomly assigned to either talk with a partner in an online chat conversation or proceed directly to a short survey. Unknown to participants, the chat partner was a confederate coached to say positive things about sleep and the message ('positive' chat condition), negative things ('negative' chat condition), or unrelated things ('natural' chat condition). All respondents completed a short survey on beliefs about sleep, reactions to the message, and intentions to get adequate sleep. Respondents had greater intentions to engage in healthy sleep when they engaged in positive conversation following message exposure than when they engaged in negative conversation after the message (p < 0.001). Positive emotion experienced in response to the message and positive chat perceptions were significant predictors (p < 0.05) of intentions to achieve healthy sleep. Health message designers may benefit from understanding how messages are exchanged in peer-to-peer conversation to better predict and explain their effects.

Obesity Stigma and Negative Perceptions of Political Leadership Competence

This study investigated whether the leadership competence of an overweight candidate is affected by exposure to weight-stigmatizing and nonstigmatizing messages. Participants read one of four messages—a weight stigma, a health stigma, a competence, or a stigma-reducing message. Fat phobia, weight controllability, partisanship, political activism, and voting behaviors were also measured. Weight controllability bias interacted with the weight stigma message to produce lower evaluations of political leadership competence. Weight controllability also correlated with higher levels of fat phobia regardless of message exposure. The evidence suggests making stigmatizing comments in print/online against a candidate based on a physical characteristic like large size negatively biases public perceptions of political leadership competence. This study of negative competence evaluation directed toward a real politician confirms the findings of earlier experimental studies with fictitious fat politicians.

Self-Affirmation Before Exposure to Health Communications Promotes Intentions and Health Behavior Change by Increasing Anticipated Regret

Health-risk information can elicit negative emotions like anticipated regret that may positively affect health persuasion. The beneficial impact of such emotions is undermined when target audiences respond defensively to the threatening information. We tested whether self-affirming (reflecting on cherished attributes) before message exposure can be used as strategy to enhance the experience of anticipated regret. Women were self-affirmed or not before exposure to a message promoting fruit and vegetable consumption. Self-affirmation increased anticipated regret and intentions reported following message exposure and consumption in the week after the intervention; regret mediated the affirmation effect on intentions. Moreover, results suggest that anticipated regret and intentions are serial mediators linking self-affirmation and behavior. By demonstrating the mediating role of anticipated regret, we provide insights into how self-affirmation may promote healthy intentions and behavior following health message exposure. Self-affirmation techniques could thus potentially be used to increase the effectiveness of health communication efforts.

Promoting Help Seeking Among Veteran Households: Associations Between Exposure to Multiple Types of Health Messages and Intentions to Utilize Related Public Health Hotlines.

This study presents preliminary evidence that exposure to different health campaigns enhance intentions to seek help from telephone hotlines among Veteran households. Data were collected from telephone surveys (N = 8,756) conducted with both Veteran (n = 3,904), and for comparison, non-Veteran households (n = 4,852). Cox proportional hazard models were used to identify associations between message exposure variables ("type" or "number") with a high intent to use different hotlines (e.g., suicide prevention, domestic violence). As the number of types of messages an individual was exposed to increased, reported high intent for hotline use also increased. This remained significant across hotline type and for both Veteran and non-Veterans households. Results underscore the need for further research on dissemination strategies of public messaging and their impact on health behavior among Veteran populations.

The Intersection of Agenda-Setting, the Media Environment, and Election Campaign Laws

AbstractMedia theory helps the process of understanding the complex political communication environment. Agenda-setting research examines the transfer of topic salience from the media agenda to the public agenda. This process is important to discuss in the policy context of election campaigns. In an election campaign context, agenda-setting has been altered considerably since its early research studies by the technology that allows individuals and organizations to use social media to communicate directly to an audience and by the campaign finance structure created by the Citizens United ruling with money that provides for greater message exposure through advertising serving as an agenda-setter.

The Intersection of Agenda-Setting, the Media Environment, and Election Campaign Laws

AbstractMedia theory helps the process of understanding the complex political communication environment. Agenda-setting research examines the transfer of topic salience from the media agenda to the public agenda. This process is important to discuss in the policy context of election campaigns. In an election campaign context, agenda-setting has been altered considerably since its early research studies by the technology that allows individuals and organizations to use social media to communicate directly to an audience and by the campaign finance structure created by the Citizens United ruling with money that provides for greater message exposure through advertising serving as an agenda-setter.

The mere green effect: An fMRI study of pro-environmental advertisements

ABSTRACTSelf-report evidence suggests that consumers prefer green products (i.e., pro-environmental) to standard products, but this is not reflected in purchase behaviors. To understand this disconnect, we exposed participants in a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanner to green and standard ads. After viewing each ad, participants rated liking and perceived sustainability. Ratings were more favorable for green ads than for control ads, but the functional MRI data suggested an opposite pattern—participants showed greater activation in regions associated with personal value and reward (ventromedial prefrontal cortex and ventral striatum) in response to control ads relative to green ads. In addition, participants showed greater activity in these regions to the extent that they reported liking control ads, but there was no such trend for green ads. In line with a neuroeconomic account, we suggest that activity in these regions may be indexing a value signal computed during message exposure that may influence downstream purchase decisions, in contrast to self-reported evaluations that may reflect social desirability concerns absent at the point of purchase.

“Jimmy Cap Before You Tap”: Developing Condom Use Messages for African American Women

This study examined which characteristics of persuasive communications are most effective in changing African American women’s condom use attitudes. Focus groups were convened with 40 African American women (Mage = 25.54, SD = 4.67) to assess their opinions on current effective strategies used to promote condom use among their peers. Participants discussed effective characteristics of messaging campaigns (i.e., source, message type, channel) and how these could be used in future prevention messages. Findings revealed that making messages that are fun, catchy, and informative, delivered frequently through social media, TV, or radio by a peer or celebrity would be perceived as most effective in changing young African American women’s attitudes. Other themes that emerged were that condom use is more strongly associated with pregnancy prevention than HIV prevention and that sexual partners were perceived to have negative condom use attitudes. Recommendations centered on increasing exposure of HIV prevention messages by placing messages on the Internet and including a funny phrase or jingle in the message so that it is easy to remember and could potentially serve as a conversation starter for discussing safe sex with partners.

Measuring Campaign Message Exposure and Public Communication Environment Exposure: Some Implications of the Distinction in the Context of Social Media

ABSTRACTThe comments in this article suggest that the measurement differences associated with the distinction between assessing exposure to specific campaign messages and assessing exposure to ideas in the public communication environment may become sharper in the context of social/digital media, compared to traditional media. The argument: using social media to deliver specific campaign messages to a large targeted audience is hard, and measurement of exposure will be more demanding than with conventional media sources. In contrast, when the goal is to capture exposure to information in the pubic communication environment, “big data” based content analyses of social media streams may be a valuable approach; still there is much more work to do to establish the validity of these approaches and their usefulness in accounting for behavior.

Testing the effects of a message framing intervention on intentions towards hearing loss prevention in adolescents

Adolescent hearing loss is a public health problem that has eluded effective intervention. A persuasive message strategy was tested for its effectiveness on adolescents' intention to listen to music at a reduced volume. The messages manipulated both type of message frame [positive consequences of listening to music at a reduced volume (gain-framed) versus negative consequences of not listening to music at a reduced volume (loss-framed)] and type of temporal context (short-term versus long-term consequences). Participants were recruited from four vocational and secondary education schools in the Netherlands and message exposure took place online during class hours. Two weeks prior to message exposure, adolescents provided data on intention and risk perception towards hearing loss and use of (digital) music players. After message exposure, 194 adolescents (mean age = 14.71 years, SD = 1.00, 37.8% males) provided immediate follow-up data on intention. Results revealed that intention to listen to music at a reduced volume increased in those exposed to a loss-framed message with short-term consequences. No changes were found in the other conditions. Messages that emphasize negative short-term consequences of not listening to music at a moderate volume have the ability to influence adolescents' intention towards hearing loss prevention.

Body Image, Eating Disorders and Role of Media among Indian Adolescents

Background: Undue concern about one’s body image is one of the psychological problems. Body image concerns are on the rise among adolescents and research suggest that it may accumulate even further. Aim: To estimate the proportion of adolescents who have concerns about their body image and to understand the relationship between eating attitudes, media and famous personalities with body image concerns. Methods: Study employed 550 students of pre-university colleges of Udupi taluk, Karnataka, India through multi stage sampling technique. Eating Attitudes Test and Socio-Cultural Attitudes Towards Appearance Questionnaire were used to collect the data. Data were analyzed using Statistical Packages for Social Sciences version 15.00. Analysis of variance and multinomial logistic regression were performed for analysis. Results: Of the total participants 47.82 % were males. Participants who perceived themselves to be thin and fat were 29.82% and 32.54% correspondingly. Tendency to develop an eating 10 disorder, prevalent among 31.09% participants, and being influenced by famous personalities were found to be significantly associated with body image concerns. Conclusion: Parents, teachers and providers of health care should interact with their kin regarding the ill effects of being excessively concerned about their body structure and dieting. One should not believe anything and everything portrayed through the media. Policies and legislations should be employed to diminish the exposure of possible detrimental media messages on children and adolescent.