The relationship of character structure to persuasive communication in advertising

The persuasive effect of character structure--defined as a person's organized set of drives, dispositions, and satisfactions with which they approach the world--was assessed in the context of printed advertising. Subjects were exposed to one of two levels of argument strength (strong versus weak) and one of two levels of message spokesperson (celebrity versus noncelebrity) in a printed-advertising task. Subjects classified as Other-directed, individuals who possess a strong need to get along with others, exhibited greater attitudinal responsiveness to the test advertisement as measured on a composite attitude scale than did those classified as Inner-directed, needing to get ahead, or succeed. Other-directed subjects' attitude scores were more responsive to the message source than were the comparable scores of Inner-directed subjects. Results regarding argument strength were not significant but suggest that Other-directed attitudes are influenced by a combination of textual arguments and social cues.