Yale approach to changing attitudes

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The " Yale Attitude Change Approach " (Original: Yale Attitude Change Approach) describes how Persuasive communication , the settings of people may change. It was developed in the 1950s at Yale University by a research group led by the psychologist Carl I. Hovland .

Aim of the studies

Hovland had been tasked with raising the morale of US soldiers during World War II, and after his return to Yale University he was also concerned with the question of how people's attitudes can be changed by media statements. In peacetime, for example, campaigns to improve health (cancer prevention, quitting smoking, currently in the USA: against childhood obesity) are launched.

Laboratory experiments

In around 50 laboratory experiments, the Hovland group varied individual parameters of communication, in particular characteristics of the speaker, characteristics of the message and characteristics of the recipient, all other things being equal . Although the artificiality of the laboratory situation limits the meaningfulness of the results of the Yale studies, the Hovland group was able to find some significant factors that influence the impact of media content.

Characteristics of the source

The same text is more likely to change attitudes if recipients are led to believe it is from a capacity than if they believe it was written by a layperson. Credibility is made up of two components: expertness and trustworthiness. Very credible sources tend to have larger attitudes changes than less credible ones.

Attitude change is more likely if the speaker is attractive than if he is not.

Features of the statement

Messages are more convincing if they do not appear to the recipient as an attempt to influence them.

When the audience decides between two speakers who have opposing views, it is beneficial for the first speaker to pause before voting; the second speaker benefits from the advertising effect if the vote is taken immediately after him.

One-sided and two-sided reasoning

  1. Recipients who agree from the outset to a statement made in the medium are more accessible to a one-sided argument for this position than to an argument that also takes the other side into account.
  2. In the case of recipients who take a contrary position to a statement made in the medium, a two-sided argument is more effective.
  3. People with a higher formal education (school education, university, etc.) are more accessible to two-sided argument than to one-sided argument.
  4. Recipients with a low level of formal education are more amenable to one-sided argument than to two-sided.
  5. In the long term, a bilateral argument is more successful, especially when the people concerned are confronted with counter- propaganda .

Arrangement of arguments

  1. People who are not interested in the topic presented in the medium and know little about it attach the greatest importance to the first argument. At the same time, it forms the framework for the interpretation of the following statements (see primacy effect ).
  2. Recipients who are very interested in the topic presented in the medium and who know a lot about the topic attach the greatest importance to the last argument (cf. recency effect ).
  3. Implicit conclusions are more effective if people are familiar with the topic under discussion, if it is not complex, if there is personal concern and the statement was made by an unreliable communicator.
  4. Explicit conclusions are more effective if the circumstances just mentioned are not given.

Terrifying appeals

Fear appeals are media content that describe the unfavorable consequences of not following the communicator's conclusions .

  1. If a statement is low in fear, the audience is not particularly interested and hardly pays it any attention.
  2. If the proportion of fear increases, the interest and attention of the audience grows. The ability of the recipients to be influenced increases.
  3. A very high proportion of fear in a statement reduces the interest and attention of the audience. It fends off threatening communicative stimuli and the chance of influencing them disappears.

Sleeper effect

→ Main article : Sleeper effect
  1. Over time there is a detachment of communication source and communication content. This means that after a few weeks, the skepticism of the recipients towards statements from unreliable sources subsides. After this time, they assess these statements more positively and remember what was said, but not by whom.
  2. However, if the unbelievable source for this statement is recalled, the recipients tend to reject the statement again.

Characteristics of the recipients

The Hovland group also looked for factors in the recipient that helped determine their ability to be influenced (suggestibility) for media content.

A distracted audience is often easier to influence than an observant one.

A medium self-esteem of the recipient promotes his ability to be influenced.

At the age of 18-25 you are easier to influence than later.

intelligence

People with lower intelligence are easier to influence than people with above-average intelligence.

Recipients with a high level of intelligence can be influenced more than less intelligent people, especially if rational and logical arguments are used. People of high intelligence are less influenced by illogical and irrational reasoning than less intelligent recipients.

Other factors

  1. People who regularly show aggressive behavior are relatively unaffected by "persuasion communication".
  2. People who exhibit psychoneurotic disorders (sweats, insomnia, persecution ideas, etc.) are also relatively insensitive to persuasive communication .

The informative value of the results of the Yale studies has been criticized again and again due to their development in the laboratory, as has the factual lack of theory of the study, which only revealed key variables in the persuasion process.

See also

further reading

  • Roland Burkart : Communication Science. Basics and problem areas; Outlines of an Interdisciplinary Social Science. 4th revised and updated edition. Böhlau, Wien et al. 2002, ISBN 978-3-8252-2259-8 , ( UTB 2259 Media Studies, Communication Studies ISSN  0340-7225 ), pp. 198ff.
    (Partly at the same time: Vienna, Univ., Habil.-Schr., 1983).
  • Michael Kunczik / Astrid Zipfel: Journalism. A study manual . Böhlau, Cologne et al. 2001, ISBN 3-412-11899-0 , ( UTB for Science 2256 Media Studies ISSN  0340-7225 ), p. 294ff.
  • Michael Schenk : Media Effects Research . 2nd completely revised edition. Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 2002, ISBN 3-16-146755-8 , pp. 77ff.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ E. Aronson , TD Wilson, RM Akert: Social Psychology . Pearson study. 6th edition 2008. ISBN 978-3-8273-7359-5 , pp. 200ff.
  2. ^ Hovland, Weiss (1951). The influence of source credibility on communication effectiveness . Public Opinion Quaterly, 15, pp. 635-650
  3. ↑ Jain, Posavac (2001). Prepurchase attribute verification, source credibility, and persuasion . Journal of Consumer Psychology, 11, pp. 169-180
  4. ↑ Eagly, Chaiken (1975). An attribution analysis of communicator characteristics on opinion change: The case of communicator attractiveness . Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 32, pp. 136-244
  5. ^ Walster, Festinger (1962). The effectiveness of "overheard" persuasive communication . Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 65, pp. 395-402
  6. ↑ Haugtvedt, Wegener (1994). Message order effects in persuasion: An attitude strength perspective . Journal of Consumer Research, 21, pp. 205-218
  7. ↑ Albarracin, Wyer (2001). Elaborative and nonelaborative processing of behavior-related communication . Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 27, pp. 691-705
  8. ↑ a b Rhodes, Wood (1992). Self-esteem and intelligence affect influenceability: The mediating role of message reception . Psychological Bulletin, 111, pp. 156-171
  9. ↑ Krosnick, Alwin (1989). Aging and susceptibility to attitude change . Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 57, pp. 416-425