Using emotion eliciting photographs to inspire awareness and attitudinal change

摘要

Photographs can be used to elicit an emotional response in the viewer to promote attitudinal change. The paper considers the types of photographs which can elicit the strongest impact on viewers and uses a case study of the Mary River Dam. The Queensland government is proposing to dam the Mary River, whilst the Save the Mary River group has been running a campaign against the proposed dam using images of the community and landscape in its protest materials and website. This paper reports on a project to understand which types of images provided by the Save the Mary River group elicit the strongest impact on viewers to inspire support for their protest, and how and why these images can increase awareness around the issues of the proposed dam as a solution to water needs.