Getting to Yes
Stephen Nicholson
American Journal of Political Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
People categorize themselves and others, creating ingroup and outgroup
distinctions. In American politics, parties constitute the in- and
outgroups, and party leaders hold sway in articulating party positions. A
party leader's endorsement of a policy can be persuasive, inducing
co-partisans to take the same position. In contrast, a party leader's
endorsement may polarize opinion, inducing out-party identifiers to take a
contrary position. Using survey experiments from the 2008 presidential
election, I examine whether in- and out-party candidate cues - John McCain
and Barack Obama - affected partisan opinion. The results indicate that
in-party leader cues do not persuade but that out-party leader cues
polarize. This finding holds in an experiment featuring President Bush in
which his endorsement did not persuade Republicans but it polarized
Democrats. Lastly, I compare the effect of party leader cues to party label
cues. The results suggest that politicians, not parties, function as
polarizing cues.
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Polarized Politics and Citizen Disengagement: The Role of Belief Systems
Laura Hussey
American Politics Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
This article examines citizens who combine liberalism on one of two major
issue dimensions with conservatism on the other, assessing whether they are
less politically engaged than "consistent" liberals and conservatives and
whether this relationship has strengthened over time with elite
polarization. It also explores the contributions of cross-pressures,
partisanship, and alienation to contemporary ideological differences in
political engagement. This article departs from most existing research by
defining ideology two dimensionally. Using the 1984-2008 American National
Election Studies, it finds that culturally conservative, economically
liberal Americans and to a lesser extent culturally liberal, economically
conservative Americans are less engaged in elections than "consistent"
liberals and conservatives. Different factors explain these differences with
liberals and conservatives, but cross-pressures do not demobilize either
"two-dimensional ideologue." Over time, the increased involvement of
liberals and conservatives has produced a growing ideological gap in
political engagement.
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Nikolaos Dimotakis, Donald Conlon & Remus Ilies
Journal of Applied Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
The authors developed and tested a model proposing that negotiator
personality interacts with the negotiation situation to influence
negotiation processes and outcomes. In 2 studies, the authors found that
negotiators high in agreeableness were best suited to integrative
negotiations and that negotiators low in agreeableness were best suited to
distributive negotiations. Consistent with this person-situation fit
argument, in Study 1 the authors found that negotiators whose dispositions
were a good fit to their negotiation context had higher levels of
physiological (cardiac) arousal at the end of the negotiation compared with
negotiators who were "misplaced" in situations inconsistent with their level
of agreeableness, and this arousal was in turn related to increased economic
outcomes. Study 2 replicated and extended the findings of Study 1, finding
that person-situation fit was related to physiological (heart rate),
psychological (positive affect), and behavioral activation (persistence)
demonstrated during the negotiation, and these measures in turn were related
to the economic outcomes achieved by participants.
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Revisions and Regret: The Cost of Changing your Mind
Geir Kirkebøen, Erik Vasaasen & Karl Halvor Teigen
Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, forthcoming
Abstract:
Decision reversals often imply improved decisions. Yet, people show a strong
resistance against changing their minds. These are well-established
findings, which suggest that changed decisions carry a subjective cost,
perhaps by being more strongly regretted. Three studies were conducted to
explore participants' regret when making reversible decisions and to test
the hypothesis that changing one's mind will increase post-outcome regret.
The first two studies employed the Ultimatum game and the Trust game. The
third study used a variant of the Monty Hall problem. All games were
conducted by individual participants playing interactively against a
computer. The outcomes were designed to capture a common characteristic of
real-life decisions: they varied from rather negative to fairly positive,
and for every outcome, it was possible to imagine both more and less
profitable outcomes. In all experiments, those who changed their minds
reported much stronger post-outcome regret than those who did not change,
even if the final outcomes were equally good (Experiments 2 and 3) or better
(Experiment 1). This finding was not because of individual differences with
respect to gender, tendency to regret, or tendency to maximize. Previous
studies have found that those who change from a correct to wrong option
regret more than those who select a wrong option directly. This study
indicates that this finding is a special case of a more general phenomenon:
changing one's mind seems to come with a cost, even when one ends up with
favorable outcomes.
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Source Expertise and Persuasion: The Effects of Perceived Opposition or Support on Message Scrutiny
Jason Clark et al.
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, forthcoming
Abstract:
Compared to nonexperts, expert sources have been considered to elicit more
processing of persuasive messages because of expectations that the
information is likely to be valid or accurate. However, depending on the
position of an advocacy, source expertise could activate other motives that
may produce a very different relation from that found in past research. When
messages are counterattitudinal (disagreeable), experts should motivate
greater processing than nonexpert sources because of expectations that they
will likely provide robust opposition to one's existing views. In contrast,
when advocacies are proattitudinal (agreeable), nonexpert rather than expert
sources should elicit more scrutiny because of perceptions that they will
likely provide inadequate support to recipients' current views. Two studies
offer evidence consistent with these predictions. Manipulations of source
expertise created different expectations regarding the strength of
opposition or support, and these perceptions accounted for effects of source
expertise on the amount of message scrutiny.
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Value Activation and Processing of Persuasive Messages
Kevin Blankenship & Duane Wegener
Social Psychological and Personality Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Basing attitudes on one's core values has long been thought to result in
strong, consequential attitudes. Recent research suggests a less direct
route for values to influence attitude strength-by influencing the extent to
which people process attitude-relevant information. That research induce d
research participants to explicitly consider important or unimportant values
in relation to the persuasive message. In contrast, the current research
examined whether mere activation of important values before encountering a
persuasive message could enhance message processing. Normatively important
or unimportant values were subtly activated by simply presenting values
(Experiment 1) including the values in a previous "unrelated" study
(Experiment 2) or rating the importance of values in a questionnaire prior
to the persuasive message. Experiment 3 suggested that important values are
not equivalent to any other important constructs. Activation of important
values increased information processing but activation of equally important
alternative attitudes did not.
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Tell Me What I Did Wrong: Experts Seek and Respond to Negative Feedback
Stacey Finkelstein & Ayelet Fishbach
Journal of Consumer Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
A large proportion of marketing communication concerns feedback to
consumers. This article explores what feedback people seek and respond to.
We predict and find a shift from positive to negative feedback as people
gain expertise. We document this shift in a variety of domains, including
feedback on language acquisition, pursuit of environmental causes, and use
of consumer products. Across these domains, novices sought and responded to
positive feedback, and experts sought and responded to negative feedback. We
examine a motivational account for the shift in feedback: positive feedback
increased novices' commitment, and negative feedback increased experts'
sense that they were making insufficient progress.
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Can Cheap Talk Deter? An Experimental Analysis
Dustin Tingley & Barbara Walter
Journal of Conflict Resolution, forthcoming
Abstract:
What effect does cheap talk have on behavior in an entry-deterrence game? We
shed light on this question using incentivized laboratory experiments of the
strategic interaction between defenders and potential entrants. Our results
suggest that cheap talk can have a substantial impact on the behavior of
both the target and the speaker. By sending costless threats to potential
entrants, defenders are able to deter opponents in early periods of play.
Moreover, after issuing threats, defenders become more eager to fight. We
offer a number of different explanations for this behavior. These results
bring fresh evidence about the potential importance of costless verbal
communication to the field of international relations.
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The innuendo effect: Hearing the positive but inferring the negative
Nicolas Kervyn, Hilary Bergsieker & Susan Fiske
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract: Speakers can convey mixed impressions by providing only positive information. As a series of studies shows, when communicators omit information on a salient, relevant dimension of social perception, listeners make negative inferences about the target on that omitted dimension, despite directly receiving only positive information on another dimension (Studies 1 & 2a). These negative inferences mediated the effect of the innuendo manipulation on judgments about the target person's suitability for inclusion in one's group. Simulating communication. Study 2b participants read Study 2a's descriptions and showed this innuendo effect is stronger for descriptions of female as opposed to male targets in an academic domain. We discuss implications of innuendo for the communication and perpetuation of mixed impressions and their prevalence in descriptions of subordinate group members.
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What to Say When: Influencing Consumer Choice by Delaying the Presentation of Favorable Information
Xin Ge, Gerald Häubl & Terry Elrod
Journal of Consumer Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Delaying the presentation of some favorable information about an alternative
(e.g., a product, service, brand, store, or cause) until after consumers
have completed their pre-choice screening can increase that alternative's
choice share. While such a delay reduces the alternative's chance of
surviving the screening, it can actually increase its probability of
ultimately being chosen. Evidence from five experiments demonstrates this
preference-enhancing effect of the delayed presentation of favorable
information, and it illustrates the underlying preference dynamics across
decision stages associated with such a delay. The findings also indicate
that this preference-enhancing effect is driven by a combination of two
mental mechanisms - a shift in the decision weights of attribute dimensions
(rendering dimensions on which a delay occurs more influential across all
alternatives) and an overall preference boost for the alternative about
which information is delayed.
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Traci Craig & Kevin Blankenship
Journal of Language and Social Psychology, September 2011, Pages 290-310
Abstract:
The present studies explore the role of linguistic extremity on message
processing, persuasion, and behavioral intentions. Past research has found
that the use of intense language has led to increases in attitude-behavior
consistency. The authors present research that suggests that one reason for
these effects is because linguistic extremity increases message processing,
a common antecedent to attitude strength. Across two studies, linguistic
extremity increased message processing relative to a control message. Study
2 replicated the increased processing effects with a different topic, and
linguistic extremity led to increases in intentions to sign a petition when
the message contained strong arguments. Furthermore, increases in behavioral
intentions were mediated by participants' amount of processing. Implications
for linguistic extremity as a linguistic marker of attitude strength are
discussed.
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Roderick Swaab et al.
Personality and Social Psychology Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
Two quantitative meta-analyses examined how the presence of visual channels,
vocal channels, and synchronicity influences the quality of outcomes in
negotiations and group decision making. A qualitative review of the
literature found that the effects of communication channels vary widely and
that existing theories do not sufficiently account for these contradictory
findings. To parsimoniously encompass the full range of existing data, the
authors created the communication orientation model, which proposes that the
impact of communication channels is shaped by communicators' orientations to
cooperate or not. Two meta-analyses - conducted separately for negotiations
and decision making - provide strong support for this model. Overall, the
presence of communication channels (a) increased the achievement of
high-quality outcomes for communicators with a neutral orientation, (b) did
not affect the outcomes for communicators with a cooperative orientation,
but (c) hurt communicators' outcomes with a noncooperative orientation.
Tests of cross-cultural differences in each meta-analysis further supported
the model: for those with a neutral orientation, the beneficial effects of
communication channels were weaker within East Asian cultures (i.e.,
Interdependent and therefore more predisposed towards cooperation) than
within Western cultures (i.e., Independent).
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Who Taught Me That? Repurposed News, Blog Structure, and Source Identification
Emily Vraga et al.
Journal of Communication, October 2011, Pages 795-815
Abstract:
Changes in the information society, especially the rise of blogs, have
refocused attention on questions of media modality, source identification,
and motivation in online environments. We manipulate the structure of a
blogger's critique on a news story (global vs. interspersed) and the
partisan target of the blogger (Democrats vs. Republicans) in an experiment
embedded in an online survey. Our results support our expectations: The more
difficult story format decreases the ability of less motivated readers to
correctly identify the source of their information, without affecting the
motivated. These effects of structure on source identification are
democratically consequential when people rely on blogs for facts about
public affairs without the proper cautionary caveats regarding the
credibility of the source.
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Hedges, Tag Questions, Message Processing, and Persuasion
Lawrence Hosman & Susan Siltanen
Journal of Language and Social Psychology, September 2011, Pages 341-349
Abstract:
This study explored the effects of tag questions, hedges, and argument
quality on receivers' perceptions of a speaker, perceptions of message
quality, cognitive responses, and attitude change. The results showed that
tag questions and argument quality directly affected speaker and message
quality perceptions and cognitive responses. They also interacted to
directly affect perceptions of the speaker's power and credibility.
Mediational analyses also showed that tag questions and argument quality had
indirect effects on attitude change. The results are discussed in terms of
their implications for the cognitive processing of and research on
linguistic markers of powerlessness.