Believe Me, I Have No Idea What I’m Talking About: The Effects of Source Certainty on Consumer Involvement and Persuasion

This research explores the effect of source certainty—that is, the level of certainty expressed by a message source—on persuasion. The authors propose an incongruity hypothesis, suggesting that source certainty effects depend on perceived source expertise. In three experiments, consumers receive persuasive messages from sources of varying expertise and certainty. Across studies, low expertise sources violate expectancies, stimulate involvement, and promote persuasion when they express certainty, whereas high expertise sources violate expectancies, stimulate involvement, and promote persuasion when they express uncertainty. Thus, nonexpert (expert) sources can gain interest and influence by expressing certainty (uncertainty).

[1]  J. N. Bassili.  Meta-judgmental versus operative indexes of psychological attributes: The case of measures of attitude strength. , 1996 .

[2]  R. Norman,et al.  When what is said is important: A comparison of expert and attractive sources , 1976 .

[3]  Reid Hastie,et al.  Calibration Trumps Confidence as a Basis for Witness Credibility , 2006, Psychological science.

[4]  R. Petty,et al.  Source Attributions and Persuasion: Perceived Honesty as a Determinant of Message Scrutiny , 1995 .

[5]  Zakary L. Tormala,et al.  The Perceived Informational Basis of Attitudes: Implications for Subjective Ambivalence , 2008, Personality & social psychology bulletin.

[6]  Ira J. Dolich,et al.  An Examination of Ego-Involvement As a Modifier of Attitude Changes Caused From Product Testing , 1979 .

[7]  Michael Diehl,et al.  Multiple Source Characteristics and Persuasion: Source Inconsistency as a Determinant of Message Scrutiny , 2002 .

[8]  R. Petty,et al.  Attitude strength : antecedents and consequences , 1995 .

[9]  M. Zanna,et al.  Attitudinal qualities relating to the strength of the attitude-behavior relationship☆ , 1978 .

[10]  Richard E. Petty,et al.  Majority and minority influence : source-position imbalance as a determinant of message scrutiny , 1994 .

[11]  James Ramirez,et al.  Good probabilistic forecasters: The ‘consumer's’ perspective , 1996 .

[12]  C. F. Kao,et al.  Central and peripheral routes to persuasion: An individual difference perspective. , 1986 .

[13]  J. Cacioppo,et al.  Issue involvement can increase or decrease persuasion by enhancing message-relevant cognitive responses. , 1979 .

[14]  I. Ajzen,et al.  Belief, Attitude, Intention, and Behavior: An Introduction to Theory and Research , 1977 .

[15]  R. Petty,et al.  What doesn't kill me makes me stronger: the effects of resisting persuasion on attitude certainty. , 2002, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[16]  Derek D. Rucker,et al.  Attitude Certainty: A Review of Past Findings and Emerging Perspectives , 2007 .

[17]  D. Moore,et al.  The trouble with overconfidence. , 2008, Psychological review.

[18]  J. Cacioppo,et al.  Personal involvement as a determinant of argument based persuasion , 1981 .

[19]  A. V. Muthukrishnan,et al.  Does Greater Amount of Information Always Bolster Attitudinal Resistance? , 2001 .

[20]  Zakary L. Tormala,et al.  A new look at the consequences of attitude certainty: the amplification hypothesis. , 2008, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[21]  Chrysanthos Dellarocas,et al.  The Digitization of Word-of-Mouth: Promise and Challenges of Online Feedback Mechanisms , 2003, Manag. Sci..

[22]  Derek D. Rucker,et al.  Unpacking attitude certainty: attitude clarity and attitude correctness. , 2007, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[23]  Carl A. Kallgren,et al.  Communicator Attributes and Persuasion , 1988, Personality & social psychology bulletin.

[24]  Eric R. Stone,et al.  Intuitive evaluation of likelihood judgment producers: evidence for a confidence heuristic , 2004 .

[25]  M. Greenberg,et al.  The Role of Eyewitness Confidence in Juror Perceptions of Credibility1 , 1986 .

[26]  C. Judd,et al.  When moderation is mediated and mediation is moderated. , 2005, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[27]  Janet A. Sniezek,et al.  Trust, Confidence, and Expertise in a Judge-Advisor System. , 2001, Organizational behavior and human decision processes.

[28]  R. Petty,et al.  When credibility attacks: The reverse impact of source credibility on persuasion , 2006 .

[29]  D. Stephen Lindsay,et al.  Accuracy and Confidence in Person Identification: The Relationship Is Strong When Witnessing Conditions Vary Widely , 1998 .

[30]  Duane T. Wegener,et al.  Attitude change: Multiple roles for persuasion variables. , 1998 .

[31]  George Y. Bizer,et al.  Memory-based versus on-line processing : Implications for attitude strength , 2006 .

[32]  Wendy Wood,et al.  Stages in the Analysis of Persuasive Messages: The Role of Causal Attributions and Message Comprehension. , 1981 .

[33]  S. Fiske,et al.  The Handbook of Social Psychology , 1935 .

[34]  G. Bohner,et al.  When expertise backfires: contrast and assimilation effects in persuasion. , 2002, The British journal of social psychology.

[35]  R. Petty,et al.  Message Framing and Persuasion: A Message Processing Analysis , 1996 .

[36]  Gideon Keren,et al.  Why isp = .90 better thanp = .70? Preference for definitive predictions by lay consumers of probability judgments , 2001 .

[37]  Kenneth R. Lord,et al.  Picture-Based Persuasion Processes and the Moderating Role of Involvement , 1991 .

[38]  Zakary L. Tormala,et al.  Assimilation and Contrast in Persuasion , 2007, Personality & social psychology bulletin.

[39]  J. Cacioppo,et al.  Central and Peripheral Routes to Advertising Effectiveness: The Moderating Role of Involvement , 1983 .

[40]  E. Aronson,et al.  To err is humanizing--sometimes: effects of self-esteem, competence, and a pratfall on interpersonal attraction. , 1970, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[41]  Chanthika Pornpitakpan.  The Persuasiveness of Source Credibility: A Critical Review of Five Decades' Evidence , 2004 .

[42]  R. Petty,et al.  The Influence of Spokesperson Trustworthiness on Message Elaboration, Attitude Strength, and Advertising Effectiveness , 2003 .

[43]  Ida E. Berger,et al.  The Effect of Advertising on Attitude Accessibility, Attitude Confidence, and the Attitude-Behavior Relationship , 1989 .

[44]  Zakary L. Tormala,et al.  Beyond attitude consensus: The social context of persuasion and resistance☆ , 2009 .

[45]  Zakary L. Tormala,et al.  source trustworthiness and inForMation processing in Multiple Message situations: a contextual analysis , 2008 .

[46]  S. Chaiken,et al.  Promoting systematic processing in low-motivation settings: effect of incongruent information on processing and judgment. , 1991, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[47]  Alice H. Eagly,et al.  Heuristic and systematic information processing within and beyond the persuasion context. , 1989 .

[48]  Yong-Soon Kang,et al.  Beauty and the Beholder: Toward an Integrative Model of Communication Source Effects , 2006 .

[49]  Mark Snyder,et al.  Communicator attractiveness and opinion change. , 1971 .

[50]  Leila T. Worth,et al.  Processing of persuasive in-group messages. , 1990, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[51]  Robert E. Smith,et al.  The Relative Endurance of Attitudes, Confidence, and Attitude-Behavior Consistency: The Role of Information Source and Delay , 1998 .

[52]  John M Boone,et al.  The trouble with CTD100. , 2007, Medical physics.

[53]  S. Chaiken,et al.  Heuristic processing can bias systematic processing: effects of source credibility, argument ambiguity, and task importance on attitude judgment. , 1994, Journal of personality and social psychology.