published_or_final_version / Psychology / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

The study examined the ways in which individuals manage inconsistent information about actors and fictional character that the actors play. Previous research suggested that people tend to attribute characters' characteristics to the actors. Therefore, actor-character inconsistency might be deemed as hypocritical and undermine the effects of the media content. However, this effect was hypothesized to be moderated by information processing mode. Specifically, when viewers transport into the narrative, namely, become absorbed in the story, they are not able to integrate actor information with character information. Similarly, when processing the message heuristically, viewers lack sufficient cognitive resources to integrate actor information. Thus, it was hypothesized that character incongruence will only diminish media effects when viewers process the media content critically. These hypotheses were explored in the context of perceptions of cosmetic surgery and sexual objectification of women. Participants read a fictitious interview in which the actor Raymond Romano expressed either approval of breast augmentation procedures or criticized this practice. Then, participants watched an edited segment from an Everybody Loves Raymond episode in which Romano played the role of a character that encouraged his wife to undergo cosmetic surgery. Viewers were requested to engage in issue elaboration, encouraged to transport into the show (narrative elaboration) or had to complete a distraction task while watching (heuristic processing). They listed all the thoughts they had during the media exposure and completed questionnaires assessing attitudes towards cosmetic surgery and sexual objectification of women. The same measures were completed again, one week after the lab session. Analysis of viewers' reported thoughts indicated that the manipulation successfully induced the different types of processing. Further, participants in the issue elaboration condition tended to generate both message consistent thoughts and counter-augments, whereas participants in the narrative elaboration condition generated few counter-arguments. In the heuristic processing condition, viewers listed very few thoughts, and did not counter-argue with the message. However, narrative consistent or inconsistent thoughts did not affect persuasion. Finally, incongruence between the actor and the character did not reduce persuasiveness of the message or hinder actor's likability, suggesting that viewers successfully maintain separate actor and character schemas.

An investigation of factors in the persuasion process was conducted in this thesis. Personalitys factors of dogmatism and Internal-External locus of control were examined to determine whether they would be meaningful predictors of opinion change to a persuasive communication. The researcher also examined whether these two personality factors would interact with varying degrees of source credibility.The researcher had expected both personality factors would be significant predictors of a criterion of attitude change, and that once statistical control for dogmatism and Internal-External locus of control had been provided, there would not be a significant relationship at the .05 level between source credibility and attitude change.To test these assumptions a controlled experiment was conducted with 94 subjects drawn from three Ball State University Journalism classes. The subjects were administered a pretest to determine their initial attitude to an issue of tuition tax credits (i.e., a credit that may be deducted from parents' income tax for children attending college). Subjects were subsequently exposed-to a persuasive communication which argued against the tuition tax credit proposal, and then retested to determine whether there had been a shift in opinion. After subjects had responded to the posttest they were asked to argue for and against the topic. According to Rokeach's theory of the "open and closed mind," the researcher had expected to find argumentation to be related to a person's belief system, whether it was open or closed, and therefore also correlated with attitude change.Findings of the multiple regression analysis failed to substantiate the original assumptions and the research hypotheses predicting a significant relationship between the two personality factors and attitude change at the .05 level were rejected.Argumentation, however did prove to be related to attitude change, significant beyond the .01 level, but was unbound to the two personality factors. The researcher proposed that this relationship could have been the result of cognitive dissonance on the part of subjects when they were forced to choose between two positively valued beliefs: 1) a belief that tuition tax credits could help ease the burden of rising college costs, and 2) a more traditional belief that "each man whould pull his own weight in society."According to this theory, subjects who changed in their initial liking for tuition tax credits from the pretest to posttest felt compelled to offer counterarguments to justify their switch in opinion in the face of information that tuition tax credits could ultimately benefit them.

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Historically, dialectics is the general method of (early) philosophy. The philosophy rhetoric controversy of modern dialectics (or argumentation theory) is reducible to a persuasion-knowledge gap. It's addressed in five parts. First, disputes in discourse (dialectics). Critical discussion or debate involves disagreement and contention. An agent's position on an issue includes an opinion (or claim) and ground. A ground is strategically developed in a contest of strengths using psycho-social influence and persuasion. This depends on the conveyance of meaning. Dispute resolution occurs where there is preponderance and a dominant position. The remaining parts selectively elaborate this framework. Second, persuasion (rhetoric). Persuasion involves the use of appeals e.g. rhetorical devices, arguments etc. to influence the propositional attitudes of agents. A hormic-hedonic infrastructure of mind suggests that psycho-social influence occurs through interest-satisfaction and results in an attitude (acceptance-withholding or rejection) toward a proposition. An agents internally operate according to an opinion-persuasion relation with thresholds, which most likely belong to the class of sigmoid functions. Benchmarks (thresholds) are set by a standard of establishment or proof. Satisfying a good standard is a preferred condition for action. Third, reason (dianoetics). Reason is impassioned rationally-principled semi -- autonomous intellect. The hormic-hedonic infrastructure of mind suggests it's a source (ideas) and an influence (pro-rational passions). Rationality rests on concepts and principles that regulate conduct (thought, feeling and action). Rational discourse isn't fully understood game-theoretically. A jurisprudential metaphor offers proof-based decision-making as an approach. Fourth, conduct (strategics). The aim of dispute involves both persuasion and dominance in a contest of strength. Arguments are an important class of appeals; they have cogency as their strength attribute. Strategically, conduct involves argumentative strategic criticism. A universal argumentation scheme describes conduct generally and is the basis for strength aggregates. Ideally, dispute resolution occurs when one position satisfies the standard of establishment or proof. Game-theoretically, establishment- or proof-based decision-making involves scores, voting and Arrow's theorem. Fifth, the dialectics of alethic inquiry (epistemics). This is the application of dialectics to claims. Internally, they are beliefs or knowledge. Difficulties (e.g. the Gettier challenge) with the standard justified true belief (JTB) model leads to alternatives like cognitivism, gradualism and thresholdism. What is proposed is an open contested certified true belief model that makes use of a claim-persuasion relation with thresholds. It is underwritten by a progressive rational regimentation of influences that is naturally based on a common ground of pragmatic reliabilism. This requires a preference for persuasive over non-persuasive influences. Thus, knowledge is belief with proof where proof-based decision-making rests on the cogency of arguments and case. Finally, by bridging the persuasion-knowledge gap, the philosophy-rhetoric controversy is settled and a reconciliation of philosophy (representing dialectics) and rhetoric is achieved. Rhetoric is a sub-discipline of dialectics. An implication is a denial of the incommensurability of theories associated with critical discussion and debate in discourse.

Proper speaking rate is a key attribute of effective communication. Emerging persuasive technologies use computers as a tool to induce human behavioural and attitude changes. This thesis established a computational framework which can persuade people to slow down their speech and communicate more effectively. We defined a conceptual model and implemented a computer software system, both serving as the cornerstones of our persuasion framework. The computer system is designed to persuade people to be aware of their speaking rate and to slow down their speech. The combination of computer technology and persuasive technologies and theories are embedded in the system. In order to conduct effective persuasion, a number of computer-based survey questions were asked and a short tailored letter was generated for each participant. A virtual coach system monitored and reminded the participant to slow down. A few adaptive cues were used to enhance the effects of the persuasion. We evaluated the feasibility and effectiveness of the overall system. At the same time, we evaluated the feasibility of individual elements. A total of 22 participants was selected to make up the sample. The experiments were conducted under controlled conditions. The results indicated that our system is effective in persuading people to speak more slowly. The feedback from users indicated that our system raised their awareness about speaking rate.

Thèse de doctorat : Psychologie : Nancy 2 : 2001. / Bibliographie.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Oregon, 2001. / Typescript. Includes vita and abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 140-145). Also available for download via the World Wide Web; free to University of Oregon users.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Ohio State University, 2004. / Title from first page of PDF file. Document formatted into pages; contains x, 309 p.; also includes graphics. Includes abstract and vita. Advisor: Gifford Weary, Psychology Graduate Program. Includes bibliographical references (p. 68-71).