The time for doing is not the time for change: effects of general action and inaction goals on attitude retrieval and attitude change

Implicit in many informal and formal principles of psychological change is the understudied assumption that change requires either an active approach or an inactive approach. This issue was systematically investigated by comparing the effects of general action goals and general inaction goals on attitude change. As prior attitudes facilitate preparation for an upcoming persuasive message, general action goals were hypothesized to facilitate conscious retrieval of prior attitudes and therefore hinder attitude change to a greater extent than general inaction goals. Experiment 1 demonstrated that action primes (e.g., "go," "energy") yielded faster attitude report than inaction primes (e.g., "rest," "still") among participants who were forewarned of an upcoming persuasive message. Experiment 2 showed that the faster attitude report identified in Experiment 1 was localized on attitudes toward a message topic participants were prepared to receive. Experiments 3, 4, and 5 showed that, compared with inaction primes, action primes produced less attitude change and less argument scrutiny in response to a counterattitudinal message on a previously forewarned topic. Experiment 6 confirmed that the effects of the primes on attitude change were due to differential attitude retrieval. That is, when attitude expression was induced immediately after the primes, action and inaction goals produced similar amounts of attitude change. In contrast, when no attitude expression was induced after the prime, action goals produced less attitude change than inaction goals. Finally, Experiment 7 validated the assumption that these goal effects can be reduced or reversed when the goals have already been satisfied by an intervening task.     

Concern for the in-group and opposition to affirmative action

The present experiments suggest that the desire to benefit the in-group drives dominant-group members' policy preferences, independent of concern for out-groups' outcomes. In Experiment 1, the effect of a manipulation of affirmative action procedures on policy support was mediated by how Whites expected the policy to affect fellow Whites, but not by the expected effect on minorities. In Experiments 2 and 3, when focused on losses for the White in-group, Whites' racial identity was negatively related to support for affirmative action. However, when focused on gains for the Black out-group or when participants were told that Whites were not affected by the policy, racial identity did not predict attitudes toward the policy. In Experiments 2 and 3, perceived fairness mediated these effects.     

Effects of caffeine on persuasion and attitude change: The role of secondary tasks in manipulating systematic message processing

Two experiments are reported that examine the effects of caffeine consumption on attitude change by using different secondary tasks to manipulate message processing. The first experiment employed an orientating task whilst the second experiment employed a distracter task. In both experiments participants consumed an orange‐juice drink that either contained caffeine (3.5 mg/kg body weight) or did not contain caffeine (placebo) prior to reading a counter‐attitudinal communication. The results across both experiments were similar. When message processing was reduced or under high distraction, there was no attitude change irrespective of caffeine consumption. However, when message processing was enhanced or under low distraction, there was greater attitude change in the caffeine vs. placebo conditions. Furthermore, attitudes formed after caffeine consumption resisted counter‐persuasion (Experiment 1) and led to indirect attitude change (Experiment 2). The extent that participants engaged in message‐congruent thinking mediated the amount of attitude change. These results provide evidence that moderate amounts of caffeine increase systematic processing of the arguments in the message resulting in greater agreement. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Aversive Racism and Resistance to Affirmative Action: Perception of Justice Are Not Necessarily Color Blind

This study utilized a factorial survey design to assess attitudes toward affirmative action as a function of targeted group (Black, handicapped, or elderly persons), framing of the policy (with or without social justification), and institutional context (business, college, or social organization). Resistance to affirmative action was aroused more by policies specifying Blacks as the targeted group and by policies presented without justification. Supportive of the aversive racism framework, the level of resistance to the policies presented without justification for Blacks as the target group was higher than for all other targeted groups with or without justification. Implications for these findings for strategies to reduce negative attitudes toward affirmative action are discussed.     

Predicting policy attitudes from general prejudice versus specific intergroup emotions

How are people’s social policy attitudes related to their affective reactions to the social groups affected by those policies? From a threat-based perspective, specific emotions toward a group—above and beyond general prejudice toward that group—should predict attitudes toward a policy affecting the group. To test this, 128 participants reported their support for four social policies, their general and specific affective reactions to each affected group, and the threats ostensibly posed by that group. Although general prejudice failed to predict each policy attitude after controlling for the specific emotions, specific emotions did indeed significantly predict each policy attitude after controlling for general prejudice. Moreover, these specific emotions tended to mediate predicted relationships between perceived threats and policy attitudes. In all, these results highlight the benefits of assessing specific intergroup emotions as they relate to political arenas.     

Attitudes Toward Affirmative Action: A Comparison of Color-Blind Versus Modern Racist Attitudes

In the hotly contested issue of affirmative action, detractors maintain that the use of race-conscious policies to remedy past discrimination is contraindicative of a color-blind society. Supporters of affirmative action maintain that while a color-blind society may be desirable, acts of past discrimination and current institutional racism make it necessary to use race-conscious policies. Past research has shown that the demographic variables of race and sex, as well as modern racist attitudes predict attitudes toward affirmative action. This investigation examined the relationship between color-blind attitudes, modern racist attitudes, and attitudes toward affirmative action. Results confirmed a positive relationship between modern racism and color-blind attitudes. After controlling for race and sex, colorblind attitudes emerged as the strongest predictor of attitudes toward affirmative action, followed by modern racism.     

Value Relevance and the Value-Attitude Relation: Value Expressiveness Versus Halo Effects

This study examined whether considering the relevance of values to an attitude issue differentiated between two processes potentially underlying the relations between undergraduates' general value priorities and their attitudes toward capital punishment and affirmative action: value expressiveness, whereby attitude express values, and halo effects, whereby attitudes affect perception of values. In line with findings that indicate the attitudes of low self-monitors (SMs) are value expressive, while those of high SMs are not, the impact of value relevance on the value-attitude relation differed for high and low SMs. Low SMs' attitudes were correlated only with those values deemed relevant to an attitude issue, while high SMs' attitudes were related to both relevant and irrelevant values. Regression analyses revealed that controlling for the relation between low SMs' attitudes and irrelevant values slightly increased the relation between their attitudes and relevant values. Controlling for the relation between high SMs' attitudes and irrelevant values, in contrast, decreased the strength of the relation between their attitudes and relevant values. This suggest the magnitude of the relation between attitudes and relevant values, after controlling for the extent to which attitudes are tied to irrelevant values, may reflect the extent to which attitudes are value expressive. The implications of these findings for the methods used to change values and attitudes are also discussed.     

Support for Race‐Based Affirmative Action: Self‐interest and Procedural Justice1

The current study examines attitudes toward affirmative action. Hypotheses related to self‐interest concerning perceptions of the benefits of affirmative action and hypotheses derived from procedural justice research regarding the structure of policy statements both received support. A survey completed by 387 undergraduate and graduate student participants found greater perception of benefits resulting from affirmative action policies, defined in terms of increased opportunity (concrete benefit) and increased satisfaction (abstract benefit), related to greater support for affirmative action. Policies presented with justification received more support than did policies presented without justification. Ethnicity did not directly affect support for affirmative action; however, ethnicity did affect perceptions of the benefits of affirmative action. Perceptions of the benefits of affirmative action mediated ethnicity effects. Suggestions for increasing support for affirmative action are provided.     

On-line and memory-based modification of attitudes: determinants of message recall-attitude change correspondence

Experiments investigated the impact of message elaboration on attitude change-message recall correspondence when attitude change occurs in an on-line (as attitude-relevant information is received), or memory-based (on the basis of retrieved attitude-relevant information) fashion. In 2 experiments, Ss' processing goals were manipulated to increase or inhibit on-line change and message elaboration. As predicted, Ss reported postexposure attitudes more rapidly in on-line vs memory-based conditions. Decreased message elaboration increased attitude-recall correspondence, regardless of when attitude change occurred. Increased elaboration produced elaboration-attitude judgment correspondence. Results suggest that recall of message content will best predict persuasion when message content is encoded free of elaborations, regardless of when attitude change occurs.     

The vulnerability of values to attack: inoculation of values and value-relevant attitudes

Based on the values-as-truisms hypothesis and inoculation theory, two experiments tested whether providing cognitive defenses for the value of equality induces resistance against a message attacking this value. Experiment 1 found that participants who generated cognitive support in an active-supportive or an active-refutational defense were less persuaded by a subsequent message attacking equality than were participants who engaged in no prior defense. Experiment 2 examined the effects of an active-refutational defense and a passive-refutational defense, which simply asked participants to read reasons supporting or opposing equality. Results indicated additive effects of the active and passive defenses, such that participants were most resistant to the anti-equality message when they were given both defenses. Mediational analysis across both experiments revealed that the defenses increased counterargumentation of the anti-equality message, which led to increased post-attack importance of equality and predicted more favorable equality-relevant attitudes and values.     

Why Do White Americans Oppose Race‐Targeted Policies? Clarifying the Impact of Symbolic Racism

Measures of symbolic racism (SR) have often been used to tap racial prejudice toward Blacks. However, given the wording of questions used for this purpose, some of the apparent effects on attitudes toward policies to help Blacks may instead be due to political conservatism, attitudes toward government, and/or attitudes toward redistributive government policies in general. Using data from national probability sample surveys and an experiment, we explored whether SR has effects even when controlling for these potential confounds and whether its effects are specific to policies involving Blacks. Holding constant conservatism and attitudes toward limited government, SR predicted Whites' opposition to policies designed to help Blacks and more weakly predicted attitudes toward social programs whose beneficiaries were racially ambiguous. An experimental manipulation of policy beneficiaries revealed that SR predicted policy attitudes when Blacks were the beneficiary but not when women were. These findings are consistent with the claim that SR's association with racial policy preferences is not due to these confounds.     

Framing the EU as Common Project vs. Common Heritage: Effects on Attitudes Towards the EU Deepening and Widening

The present study investigated the effects of framing the European Union (EU) as a common project vs. a common heritage on participants’ attitude towards EU integration (Experiment 1) and EU enlargement (Experiment 2). An additional aim was exploring whether the different frames affected the strength of identification with the EU, and if the framing effect on attitudes was mediated by participants’ identification with the EU and/or by their message evaluation (Experiment 3). Results showed that a common project-based frame was more effective than a common heritage-based frame in promoting positive attitude toward EU integration and enlargement, as well as participants’ identification with the EU, which mediated the framing effect on both attitudes; the mediation of participants’ message evaluation was not significant. The procedure of the last experiment was replicated on a British sample (Experiment 4), showing a similar pattern of results.     

Cognitive and affective matching effects in persuasion: an amplification perspective

Past research suggests that cognitive and affective attitudes are more open to change toward cognitive and affective (i.e., matched) persuasive attacks, respectively. The present research investigates how attitude certainty influences this openness. Although an extensive literature suggests that certainty generally reduces an attitude's openness to change, the authors explore the possibility that certainty might increase an attitude's openness to change in the context of affective or cognitive appeals. Based on the recently proposed amplification hypothesis, the authors posit that high (vs. low) attitude certainty will boost the resistance of attitudes to mismatched attacks (e.g., affective attitudes attacked by cognitive messages) but boost the openness of attitudes to matched attacks (e.g., affective attitudes attacked by affective messages). Two experiments provide support for this hypothesis. Implications for increasing the openness of attitudes to both matched and mismatched attacks are discussed.     

Attitudes toward hiring people with disabilities: A meta-cognitive approach to persuasion

Attitudes toward hiring people with disabilities are becoming critical for promoting diversity and egalitarianism within organizations. The few interventions designed to promote positive attitudes toward people with disabilities have relied on changing either the direction and/or the amount of thoughts people generate with regard to this discriminated, understudied group. In the present research, we examine the impact of a different psychological process of attitude change based on meta-cognition, or thinking about thinking. We used a meta-cognitive approach to changing prejudiced attitudes because thoughtful processes are often overlooked or denied with regard to this particular group. Specifically, we explored the impact of thought confidence on attitude change across two studies designed to change attitudes toward the incorporation of people with disabilities in companies. In each study, participants first generated either positive or negative thoughts about the proposal (thought valence manipulation). Then, the confidence in those thoughts was measured (Study 1) or manipulated (Study 2). In concert with the self-validation hypothesis, results showed that when thought confidence was relatively high (vs. low), thought valence had a greater impact on attitudes. Thus, thought valence was more predictive of attitudes when participants were confident in their thoughts. Specifically, confidence in thoughts enhanced persuasion for positive thoughts but reduced persuasion for negative thoughts. These findings provide insights into assessing effects of interventions aiming at improving attitudes toward the inclusion of minority groups in organizations.     

Resistance to persuasive messages as a function of majority and minority source status

Three experiments examined the extent to which attitudes following majority and minority influence are resistant to counter-persuasion. In Experiment 1, participants’ attitudes were measured after being exposed to two messages which argued opposite positions (initial pro-attitudinal message and subsequent, counter-attitudinal counter-message). Attitudes following minority endorsement of the initial message were more resistant to a (second) counter-message than attitudes following majority endorsement of the initial message. Experiment 2 replicated this finding when the message direction was reversed (counter-attitudinal initial message and pro-attitudinal counter-message) and showed that the level of message elaboration mediated the amount of attitude resistance. Experiment 3 included conditions where participants received only the counter-message and showed that minority-source participants had resisted the second message (counter-message) rather than being influenced by it. These results show that minority influence induces systematic processing of its arguments which leads to attitudes which are resistant to counter-persuasion.     

Source Credibility and Attitude Certainty: A Metacognitive Analysis of Resistance to Persuasion

Recent research (Tormala & Petty, 2002) has demonstrated that when people resist persuasion, they can perceive this resistance and become more certain of their initial attitudes. This research explores the role of source credibility in determining when this effect occurs. In two experiments, participants received a counterattitudinal persuasive message. When participants counterargued this message, they became more certain of their attitudes, but only when it came from a source with high expertise. When the message came from a source with low expertise, resisting it had no impact on attitude certainty. This effect was shown using both a traditional measure of attitude certainty (Experiment 1) and a well‐established consequence of certainty—the correspondence between attitudes and behavioral intentions (Experiment 2). In addition, the effect was confined to high elaboration conditions, and occurred even when participants were not explicitly instructed to counterargue. These results are consistent with a metacognitive framework proposed to understand resistance to persuasion.     

Forming implicit and explicit attitudes toward individuals: social group association cues

The authors explored how social group cues (e.g., obesity, physical attractiveness) strongly associated with valence affect the formation of attitudes toward individuals. Although explicit attitude formation has been examined in much past research (e.g., S. T. Fiske & S. L. Neuberg, 1990), in the current work, the authors considered how implicit as well as explicit attitudes toward individuals are influenced by these cues. On the basis of a systems of evaluation perspective (e.g., R. J. Rydell & A. R. McConnell, 2006; R. J. Rydell, A. R. McConnell, D. M. Mackie, & L. M. Strain, 2006), the authors anticipated and found that social group cues had a strong impact on implicit attitude formation in all cases and on explicit attitude formation when behavioral information about the target was ambiguous. These findings obtained for cues related to obesity (Experiments 1 and 4) and physical attractiveness (Experiment 2). In Experiment 3, parallel findings were observed for race, and participants holding greater implicit racial prejudice against African Americans formed more negative implicit attitudes toward a novel African American target person than did participants with less implicit racial prejudice. Implications for research on attitudes, impression formation, and stigma are discussed.     

Predictors of African American and European American adolescents' endorsement of race-conscious social policies

To examine the predictors of adolescents' evaluations of affirmative action and school desegregation policies, African American and European American students (ns = 94 and 116, respectively; aged 14 to 17 years) attending a racially diverse high school in the Midwestern United States completed measures of (a) implicit racial attitudes, (b) knowledge about historical racism, and (c) perceptions of and attributions for racial disparities. The following day, adolescents learned about either a proposed affirmative action policy (n = 101) or a school desegregation policy (n = 109) and completed measures of their attitudes toward the policy. Results indicated racial differences in policy support and in the factors predicting policy support. Theoretical implications of the findings are discussed.     

The Influence of Education on Attitudes toward Affirmative Action: The Role of the Policy's Strength

The present research examined the influence of education on attitudes toward affirmative action. Studies 1 and 2 showed no impact of education on attitudes toward “soft” policies of affirmative action. In contrast, they showed less support of the more educated to “hard” policies of affirmative action. Neither prejudice (Study 2), nor understanding of the affirmative‐action policies (Study 3) accounted for this effect. Study 4 demonstrated that the education effect is mediated by the threat posed by strong plans to meritocratic beliefs. Theoretical implications of these findings are discussed.     

A self-validation perspective on the mere thought effect

Self-generated thought has an important impact on attitude change, with repeated demonstrations of increased opportunity for thought about an attitude object increasing attitude extremity. The traditional explanation for this mere thought effect is that more time to think allows people to produce more attitude-consistent thoughts, which polarize their attitudes. Expanding on this structural perspective, the current research explores a metacognitive account for the effect of time on attitude polarization. Three experiments demonstrate that thought confidence plays an independent mediating role in the mere thought effect (Experiment 1), that it accounts for reversals in the mere thought effect when people have too much time to think (Experiment 2), and that this reversal is tied to the difficulty people have retrieving thoughts when too much time is provided (Experiment 3). Thus, taking metacognitive features of thought into account sheds new light on self-persuasion in the mere thought paradigm.