Would a madman have been so wise as this?" The effects of source credibility and message credibility on validation

Facial Trustworthiness Influences Age Differences in Visual Attention Toward Credible Versus Non-credible Messages

Background and Objectives

The literature on consumer decision-making and aging suggests that older adults make less optimal buying decisions than younger adults do, partly because older adults tend to perceive salespersons' faces as more trustworthy. This study aims to directly test the difference in the effect of perceived facial trustworthiness on buying intention between younger and older adults. It also aims to reveal the underlying mechanisms of this age-related difference by testing whether a more trustworthy face disrupts older adults' attention toward credible (vs. non-credible) information to a higher degree compared with younger adults.

Research Design and Methods

A sample of 92 younger (aged 18-37 years) and 83 older (aged 60-82 years) adults viewed advertisements for 32 products while their eye movements were captured by an eye tracker to measure their fixation duration (as an indicator of attention). The advertisements varied in terms of the credibility of the content and the trustworthiness of the salesperson's face.

Results

Both age groups showed higher buying intentions for products featured in advertisements with higher credibility and facial trustworthiness. When facial trustworthiness was lower, both age groups showed greater attentional preferences for credible over non-credible content. However, this distinction in attention disappeared in older but not younger adults with an increase in facial trustworthiness.

Discussion and Implications

Our findings suggest that although facial trustworthiness generally increases buying intention of both younger and older adults, it only reduces older (but not younger) adults' attentional discrimination between credible and non-credible content. This paper offers a novel and promising mechanism for the increase in fraud vulnerability in late adulthood.

Framing Climate Change Impacts as Moral Violations: The Pathway of Perceived Message Credibility

Climate change has been increasingly discussed in moral terms in public discourse. Despite the growing body of research on the effectiveness of moral frames in bridging the ideological divide, few studies have examined the role that perceived credibility, an important element of any persuasive appeal, plays in facilitating the framing effect. With the objective of further understanding how moral frames may engage individuals with different ideologies in climate change and refining climate change messaging strategies, two experimental surveys were conducted to examine the effects of moral violation frames on climate engagement. Specifically, a moderated mediation model was tested. The model posits that message credibility mediates the relationship between moral frames and policy support, as well as the relationship between moral frames and behavior intention. Moreover, political ideology moderated the indirect effects of message credibility. Based on moral foundations theory, seven messages were designed to activate individualizing and binding moral foundations. The results indicated that credibility consistently mediated the effects of the moral violation frame on climate engagement and that liberal-leaning individuals were more likely to perceive an individualizing frame as more credible than a binding frame. However, this difference was smaller among conservative-leaning individuals, with evidence for this moderated mediation model found only for policy support among college students. This study suggests that credibility is key for effective moral violations arguments of climate change.

The effectiveness of graphic health warnings on tobacco products: a systematic review on perceived harm and quit intentions

BACKGROUND

Examination of the format and framing of the graphic health warnings (GHWs) on tobacco products and their impact on tobacco cessation has received increasing attention. This review focused on systematically identifying and synthesizing evidence of longitudinal studies that evaluate different GHW formats and specifically considered GHW influence on perceived risk of tobacco use and quit intentions.

METHODS

Ten databases were systematically searched for relevant records in December 2017 and again in September 2019. Thirty-five longitudinal studies were identified and analyzed in terms of the formatting of GHWs and the outcomes of perceived risk and quit intentions. Quality assessment of all studies was conducted.

RESULTS

This review found graphics exceeding 50% of packs were the most common ratio for GHWs, and identified an ongoing reliance on negatively framed messages and limited source attribution. Perceived harms and quit intentions were increased by GHWs. However, wear-out effects were observed regardless of GHW format indicating the length of time warnings are present in market warrants ongoing research attention to identify wear out points. Quit intentions and perceived harm were also combined into a cognitive response measure, limiting the evaluation of the effects of each GHW format variables in those cases. In addition, alternative GHW package inserts were found to be a complimentary approach to traditional GHWs.

CONCLUSIONS

This review demonstrated the role of GHWs on increasing quit intentions and perceptions of health risks by evaluating quality-assessed longitudinal research designs. The findings of this study recommend testing alternate GHW formats that communicate quit benefits and objective methodologies to extend beyond self-report.

Source credibility modulates the validation of implausible information

Validation of text information as a general mechanism for detecting inconsistent or false information is an integral part of text comprehension. This study examined how the credibility of the information source affects validation processes. Two experiments investigated combined effects of source credibility and plausibility of information during validation with explicit (ratings) and implicit (reading times) measurements. Participants read short stories with a high-credible versus low-credible person that stated a consistent or inconsistent assertion with general world knowledge. Ratings of plausibility and ratings of source credibility were lower when a credible source stated a world-knowledge inconsistent assertion compared with a low-credible source. Reading times on target sentences and on spillover sentences were slower when a credible source stated an assertion inconsistent with world knowledge compared with a low-credible source, suggesting that source information modulated the validation of implausible information. These results show that source credibility modulates validation and suggest a bidirectional relationship of perceived plausibility and source credibility in the reading process.

Climate change communication as political agenda and voters' behavior

"Climate change communication" is taking the strategic position in the international and national politics around the globe. In the recent decade, different developing nations have started considering "climate change communication" as an integral part of the political campaigns and sustainable development. Specifically, the current document comprised of two sections. In the first section of the study, authors briefly compared the attributes related to "climate change communication" in the mainstream political parties' manifesto for the general election 2018 in Pakistan in a qualitative manner. In the second part, the difference of opinion among voters of mainstream political parties towards "climate change" was examined. In a bird's eye view, the perceived seriousness of "climate change" as a real challenge among voters mapped by the independent factors of "urbanization," "industrialization," "transportation," and "waste management" for sustainable development through the primary quantitative survey of 732 voters in the country. The finding highlights (1) public understanding of "socio-scientific issues," i.e., climate change is easy to communicate, and (2) how political parties are framing and communicating about "climate change" plays a significant role in climate change communication. The study concludes that "climate change communication" holds a critical role in developing regions' future political discourse to shape sustainable development policies.