Familiarity, utility, and supportiveness as determinants of information receptivity

Timothy C. Brock, Stuart Albert, Lee A. Becker

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

22 Scopus citations

Abstract

In a 2 × 2 × 2 × 2 design, the variables were commitment to decision and 3 characteristics of a subsequent experimental communication: familiarity, utility, and supportiveness. Commitment was manipulated by having 257 undergraduates swallow a capsule which either contained or did not contain a "drug" they had previously chosen. The communication concerned drug side effects and the S could audit 1 of the experimental communications or a standard communication which discussed drug manufacturing. The dependent variables were selective intent, initial choice of experimental or standard communication; selective attention, amount of time spent auditing the experimental communication; and selective recall, subjective estimate of amount of time auditing the experimental communication. On all dependent variables, unfamiliar and useful information was preferred to familiar and nonuseful information. The main finding was that supportive information was prefered by committed Ss if the information was unfamiliar. (27 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved).

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)292-301
Number of pages10
JournalJournal of personality and social psychology
Volume14
Issue number4
DOIs
StatePublished - Apr 1970

Keywords

  • commitment to decision &
  • information receptivity, familiarity &
  • supportiveness
  • utility &

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