Past consumer research on mood has focused mainly on the impact of pre-processing mood on attitude formation, cognitive process, or behaviour. The present study, however, opens a new research direction by investigating the impact of ad characteristics on pre-processing mood. In particular, this research develops a model by combining the mood management and mood disruption mechanisms to answer the following interrelated research questions: (1) How does a consumer's mood interact with an ad's characteristics? (2) What is the effect of this interaction on subsequent mood and ad evaluation? (3) When will the above effect on ad evaluation be more likely to occur? Before the main experiment was conducted, a scale was developed to measure the mood potency of an ad -- a construct developed to capture the dimensions of an ad in eliciting affective responses. Following a systematic psychometric scale-development procedure, a reliable and valid scale with eighteen items was obtained. A 2x2x2 between-subject factorial design was conducted to test the model. The treatments included pre-processing mood pleasure, pre-processing mood arousal, and mood potency of an ad. The experiment involved exposing groups of subjects to one ad after listening to one piece of music, then comparing ad evaluations by music condition. The ad's mood potency was manipulated to elicit either a positive or negative feeling. Music was employed to vary pleasure and arousal prior to ad processing. Altogether two ads and four pieces of music were used. For the dependent measure considered (i.e., ad evaluation), findings were in accordance with a mood management interpretation. It was found that a positive mood potency ad was preferred to a negative mood potency ad either in a good or bad mood condition. Moreover, this effect was more pronounced when the arousal level was high. Regarding predictions on change in pleasure/arousal due to an exposure of an ad, only the change in pleasure yielded marginal support for the mood disruption mechanism. The findings of this study not only contribute to our understanding of research on advertising context and affective responses but also have important implications for managerial decisions on ad placing, design, and copy testing. / Business, Sauder School of / Graduate

There is impressively consistent empirical support for the hypotheses that distraction and sensory deprivation increase responsiveness to persuasive inputs. The primary purpose of the two experiments reported here was to investigate whether distraction and sensory deprivation also increase the persuasive impact of attacks on cultural truisms, and the manner in which prior provision of counterarguments in the form of a refutational inoculation message interacts with these treatments. The effects of the independent variables were assessed by dependent measures of four theoretically distinct but related aspects of the attitude change process: comprehension, message belief acceptance, attitude change and cognitive reactions r— to the persuasive message. A total of one hundred subjects served in the two experiments. In the first experiment, the effects of three levels of distraction (no distraction, low effort distraction, high effort distraction) and of the presence or absence of refutational inoculation were examined. Contrary to previous research, distraction had no effect on any of the dependent measures; refutational inoculation, consistent with previous research, reduced message belief acceptance, increased pro-truism attitudes and increased counterarguments against the message. In the second experiment, the effects of three levels of sensory deprivation (0, 1 hour, 23 hours) and of the presence or absence of refutational inoculation were examined. Again contrary to previous research, sensory deprivation had no effect on any of the dependent measures; consistent with previous research, refutational inoculation reduced message belief acceptance, increased pro-truism attitudes and increased counterargument production. The implications of these results for competing explanations of distraction and sensory deprivation effects were discussed. The cognitive dissonance interpretation of the effects of distraction and the information need interpretation of the effects of sensory deprivation appear unable to account for the failure of these manipulations to increase persuasion. These findings are more in accord with the counterargument disruption interpretation. In addition, the counterarguing process appears to represent an important aspect of the general effects of the refutational inoculation message. Further research, using the same procedures of the present study, but a non-cultural truism as the attitude topic, is required to test the counterargument disruption interpretation more rigorously. / Arts, Faculty of / Psychology, Department of / Graduate

This study uses a CDA analysis in order to take a critical look at how linguistic and visual techniques are used to create positive messages about a ‘modern’ brand, British confectionary company, Cadbury UK, in their social media discourse on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. The study goes further in exploring how these messages are constructed in a way which according to Aristotle, is ‘persuasive’, looking at how they appealed to emotion (pathos), the character or trustworthiness of the brand (ethos) and how the message created or appealed to logic (logos). The study focuses on critical theoretical perspectives regarding the promotion of consumerism in such marketing operations, whilst also looking at how the messages identified are aimed at ‘persuading’ the audience into accepting consumerist values. This thesis also views social media as a platform upon which much sociological theory still applies such as the idea of ‘self-presentation’ for example, where individuals aim to present themselves in a way which benefits them within a social setting. The main messages identified within Cadbury UK’s social media discourse were: ‘Cadbury UK is a familiar ‘voice’, ‘Cadbury UK is a brand who cares’, ‘Cadbury UK is a source of joy’, ‘Cadbury UK shares festive family values’, ‘Cadbury UK is comforting’ and ‘Cadbury UK is a cultural symbol’. What these messages point out as a general summary is that Cadbury UK had utilised their social media discourse as a way of appearing ‘familiar’ to the consumer, with the aim of creating a ‘friendly’ relationship with them. It was also found that in all cases, pathos played a vital role in making the messages ‘persuasive’. This allowed the brand to communicate with the consumer at a ‘closer’, more emotional level.

A speech; whether prepared or impromptu, ought to be a communicative process. For a speech when defined as "discourse delivered to an audience,"(1) is a communicative process by which information may be given and received. Inherent in the phrase "given and received" is the assumption that the speaker anticipates that his listener will understand and respond, and that the speech will be understood as it was intended. The difficulty present in this "intent - response" theory is the problem of insuring that the listener will understand enough to respond to what the speaker has said. In an effort to ensure response, a speaker may make use of various factors of speech which help to enhance understanding. What these factors are and how they are observed and responded to by the listener are essential questions to be considered in this study.

The purpose of this study is to examine what Barry Goldwater did in his 1963 speeches before Republican audiences in order to project himself as the candidate for nomination, to consider the persuasive appeals he made and their rhetorical merit.

This experiment furthered previous research on perceptions of speakers as a function of various vocal characteristics. A low relevance passage was recorded by male and female speakers, simulating voices of orotund, thin, thoaty, flat, breathy, as well as rate and pitch variations, so as to determine effects on persuasiveness and confidence. Main effects were found regarding gender across all vocal characteristics. While an orotund voice produced predominately positive effects of ratings of speakers' confidence and persuasiveness, a breathy effect elicited negative ratings. The male speaker was judged more harshly than the female speaker when the vocal characterization departed from the norm.

In convention speeches and inaugural addresses, presidential candidates and newly-elected presidents attempt to persuade listeners to vote for and support them. One persuasive tool that they use in these speeches is metaphor, considered a fundamental form of reasoning (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980). The present study focuses on three conceptual metaphors (POLITICS IS WAR, POLITICS IS A JOURNEY, and POLITICS IS LOVE) used in 40 speeches given by American presidents from 1944 to 2021 in order to see if there are differences in metaphor usage across political party (i.e., Democrat and Republican) and across speech type (i.e., nomination acceptance and inaugural address). All speeches were double-coded for the three metaphors by a group of trained raters, and the average count for each metaphor type per speech was found using a many-facet Rasch measurement. Mixed-effects regressions were then conducted to determine differences across political party and speech type. No quantitative differences were found in the use of these metaphors, suggesting the possibility that these speeches represent a genre of political discourse with particular patterns of metaphor usage. Some qualitative differences between political party and speech type are discussed, as well as limitations and future directions for research.

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