Protection Motivation Model Research Articles

The use of visual warnings in social marketing: The case of tobacco

Despite strong interest on the part of tobacco health practitioners, the effect of graphic warnings inserted on cigarette packs is unclear on several levels. First, the most effective themes for such messages have not been clearly identified by researchers. Second, no research has identified the ideal combination of self-efficacy and fear appeal warnings that should be inserted on cigarette packs, according to Protection Motivation Model principles. The exploratory study we conducted with French consumers to test the effectiveness of new graphic warnings proposed by the European Union in 2004 clearly demonstrates that visual messages, as opposed to text warnings, are more effective. This study also enabled us to identify the most effective themes of the European set: health warnings and social messages. Regarding future public health applications, if fear appeals are used, they need to be combined with self-efficacy and cessation support messages since they provoke avoidance reactions.

Protection motivation and deterrence: a framework for security policy compliance in organisations

Enterprises establish computer security policies to ensure the security of information resources; however, if employees and end-users of organisational information systems (IS) are not keen or are unwilling to follow security policies, then these efforts are in vain. Our study is informed by the literature on IS adoption, protection-motivation theory, deterrence theory, and organisational behaviour, and is motivated by the fundamental premise that the adoption of information security practices and policies is affected by organisational, environmental, and behavioural factors. We develop an Integrated Protection Motivation and Deterrence model of security policy compliance under the umbrella of Taylor-Todd's Decomposed Theory of Planned Behaviour. Furthermore, we evaluate the effect of organisational commitment on employee security compliance intentions. Finally, we empirically test the theoretical model with a data set representing the survey responses of 312 employees from 78 organisations. Our results suggest that (a) threat perceptions about the severity of breaches and response perceptions of response efficacy, self-efficacy, and response costs are likely to affect policy attitudes; (b) organisational commitment and social influence have a significant impact on compliance intentions; and (c) resource availability is a significant factor in enhancing self-efficacy, which in turn, is a significant predictor of policy compliance intentions. We find that employees in our sample underestimate the probability of security breaches.

Tobacco Warning Labels and the Protection Motivation Model: Implications for Canadian Tobacco Control Policy

Since 2000, Canada has mandated the use of a set of 16 rotating graphic warning labels that cover the top 50 percent of the front and back of each cigarette package. This paper examines the issue of tobacco warning labels within the context of the Protection Motivation Model. Based on this psychological model, we provide recommendations as to how tobacco warning labels could be revised to include specific recommendations and coping advice that would outline the benefits of quitting (response efficacy) and offer encouragement (self-efficacy).

Impact of Fear Appeals in a Cross-Cultural Context

SUMMARY The purpose of the present study was to examine the influence of culture on fear, using the protection motivation model as a basic theoretical framework. A 2 × 2 between-subjects experiment was conducted in the United States and in France. Participants were first shown a high threat or low threat advertisement. They were then asked to complete a questionnaire designed to measure fear, maladaptive coping, and purchase intention. A two-way multivariate analysis of covariance was used to test the hypotheses. Results indicated that compared to a low level of threat, a high level induces greater fear and leads to a higher likelihood of purchasing the advertised product. However, no significant differences on fear were found between French and U.S. subjects. Exploratory findings suggest that adaptive, instead of maladaptive, coping could play a mediating role between fear and purchase intention. The theoretical and managerial implications of the findings are discussed, and suggestions regarding the design of future fear appeals studies are provided.

Who's afraid of that ad? Applying segmentation to the protection motivation model

AbstractThe protection motivation model has contributed usefully to researchers' understanding of fear appeals in advertising. However, the empirical evidence reported to date in the literature has been mixed. This article proposes and tests a revised model including two segmenting variables as a means to resolve some of the differences evident in past research. With the use of data derived from an experimental study of juveniles' response to a range of antismoking advertising treatments, empirical support was found for the mediating role of fear in predicting behavioral intentions and for the influence of individual differences. The results, however, did not confirm the moderating role of response or self‐efficacy. Future research is clearly needed to further validate the revised protection motivation model. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

The Healthy vs the Empty Self

The Healthy vs the Empty Self

A cross-cultural study of the persuasive effect of fear appeal messages in cigarette advertising: China and Canada

This exploratory study investigated the moderating influence of culture on the persuasive power of fear appeal advertisements differing on type of fear. The conceptual framework for the study was based on Rogers' Protection Motivation model and incorporated type of fear, physical and social, as an independent variable and culture as a moderating variable. An experiment was conducted on a sample of 173 Anglo-Canadian and 180 Chinese subjects. The findings revealed that the physical threat ads had a much greater effect on the Anglo subjects than on the Chinese. Most importantly, these ads brought about an attitude change for the Anglos, but not for the Chinese. For the social fear ads, contrary to predictions, only the Anglos reacted to the ads. They tended to score higher than the Chinese on attitude towards smoking as well as on behavioural intentions.

Predicting intention for protective health behaviour: A test of the protection versus the ordered protection motivation model

Tanner and his colleagues (Eppright, Tanner, & Hunt, 1994; Tanner, Day, & Crask, 1989; Tanner, Hunt, & Eppright, 1991) proposed a reformulation of Rogers's (1983, 1984) protection motivation theory to include three major amendments: (a) the inclusion of the emotional component of fear, (b) the sequential ordering of the threat-coping appraisal processes, and (c) the role of maladaptive coping in an ordered protection motivation model. Using HIV/AIDS as the threat communication strategy, the present study tested the structural relationships hypothesised for Rogers's protection motivation model and the reformulated ordered protection motivation model, and evaluated the overall and relative fit of the two competing models in predicting intention for condom use among 248 adults. The results suggested that Rogers's original protection motivation model may be a better representation of the way individuals evaluate health-threat information than the reformulated ordered protection motivation model. Results from path analysis also demonstrated how the emotional component of fear and maladaptive coping modes operated differentially in the two models. Implications for the theory of protection motivation and its use in promoting good health behaviours are discussed.

The Intention to Give Up Smoking: Disease Versus Social Dimensions

An expanded protection motivation model was used to investigate the intention to give up smoking. Because smoking has both physiological and social-psychological foundations, the model was expanded to include the social dimensions as well as the original disease dimensions as predictors of health behavior. The participants were 96 current smokers (35 male and 61 female) in Australia; 44 were young adults (age < 22 years), and 52 were adults (age > 34 years). Data were analyzed by multiple regression with hierarchical entry, first of disease dimensions, then of social dimensions. For both the young and the adult smokers, the disease dimensions contributed significantly to the results of the regression equations. Addition of the social dimensions yielded a significant F change only for young smokers and increased the amount of variance explained from 23% to 38%.

Adolescent Processing of Social and Physical Threat Communications

Abstract Using the predictions of the ordered protection motivation model (OPM), the authors examined 371 adolescents' reactions to physical and social threat appeals in drug prevention public service announcements. Sensation seeking was also included in the experiment and analysis. In support of the notion that the social implications of a response to a threat message influence the message's effectiveness, social threat communications were more persuasive than physical threat communications. Sensation seeking emerged as an important variable moderating response to threat communications, supporting the argument that responses may be due to factors other than the communication itself. In contrast to the argument that fear arousal is a prerequisite for effective response to threat messages, the authors found fear arousal unnecessary for persuasion to occur. The implications of the findings for the effectiveness of public service announcements are discussed.

Knowledge and the ordered protection motivation model: Tools for preventing AIDS

Two types of knowledge were incorporated into the ordered protection motivation (OPM) model of threat and coping appraisal. Experiential AIDS prevention knowledge was observed to directly increase maladaptive or unsafe sex behaviors. General AIDS problem knowledge was observed to indirectly increase adaptive safe sex behaviors via certain OPM model mediators. Certain OPM mediators such as self-efficacy and vulnerability were observed to directly increase adaptive safe sex behaviors. Vulnerability was shown to directly increase maladaptive sex-related behaviors.

The Protection Motivation Model: A Normative Model of Fear Appeals

Marketing researchers have questioned the use of the fear appeal, believing it to be too difficult to implement properly. AIDS, drug abuse, and other social problems have caused practitioners to re...

The Protection Motivation Model: A Normative Model of Fear Appeals

Marketing researchers have questioned the use of the fear appeal, believing it to be too difficult to implement properly. AIDS, drug abuse, and other social problems have caused practitioners to return to the fear appeal, but with little direction from marketing theory. The protection motivation paradigm offers a prescriptive model to improve the effectiveness of the fear appeal. The authors propose and empirically test several changes to the PM model. Results indicate that fear appeals should present certain material in a specified order and attack maladaptive behaviors.

Preventing Nuclear War: Beliefs and Attitudes as Predictors of Disarmist and Deterrentist Behavior1

A survey of peace activists, defense industry workers and psychology students (n= 283) was conducted to evaluate the usefulness of Protection Motivation Theory (Maddux &amp; Rogers, 1983; Rogers, 1975) for predicting the extent and direction (Disarmist vs. Deterrentist) of respondents' efforts to prevent nuclear war. Regression analyses showed that the Protection Motivation model did account for a significant proportion of the variance in disarmist behavior, and that extending the model to include a measure of belief in the inevitability of war improved the model's predictive power. The model did not predict deterrentist advocacy, an outcome that suggests that activism in support of nuclear deterrence may be a response to a perceived threat from an “enemy” rather than a response to the threats represented by nuclear weapons and preparations for war.

Cognitive Processes in Health Enhancement: Investigation of a Combined Protection Motivation and Self-Efficacy Model

The usefulness of a combined protection motivation and self-efficacy theory as a model of health enhancement was investigated via a persuasive communications paradigm. Self-efficacy expectancy, outcome expectancy (i.e., perceived response efficacy) and outcome value (i.e., perceived social value) of a health-enhancing behavior were manipulated. As predicted, both self-efficacy expectancy and response efficacy had significant main effects on subjects' intentions to perform the health-enhancing behavior. Outcome value had no significant effect on behavioral intentions. Correlational data indicated that response efficacy was the best single predictor of intentions and that self-efficacy expectancy was also a significant predictor of intentions. Outcome value added no predictability. These results support the utility of the combined protection motivation and self-efficacy theory as a model of health enhancement.