Study of the Influence of Certain Cultural and Content Variables on the Effectiveness of Persuasive Communications in the International Field

摘要

The first experiment was designed to test the following predictive hypotheses: (1) A persuasive message is more effective when the source is seen as a member of the recipient's reference group than when the source is not a member. (2) A message translated idiomatically from another language is less effective than a message composed in the language in which it is read. (3) The effect of a source is more marked when a message is directly attributed to that source rather than simply appearing with it. (4) The effect of a persuasive communication is greater when a favorable source is shown with the message, regardless of whether the message is attributed to that source or not. (5) The effect of the group membership of the source is greater for ethnocentric individuals than for those low in ethnocentrism. (6) The effects of level of translation are more marked with highly ethnocentric individuals than with those low in ethnocentrism. (7) The more a foreign country is seen as like one's own, the more effective the persuasive communication from that country is, other things being equal. (8) The more favorably a foreign country is evaluated, the more effective its communication is, other things being equal. (9) Interest in and use of the mass media vary directly with the degree of social modernism in the user's attitudes.