Page 187 - Media Effects Advances in Theory and Research

176 PETTY, PRIESTER, BRIÑOL

communication. An argument is a piece of information that is relevant to
determining the true merits of the position taken. Although we ordinarily
think of arguments as features of the message content itself, source, recipient,
and other factors can also serve as arguments. For example, if a spokesper-
son for a beauty product says that “if you use this product, you will look like
me,” the source’s own physical attractiveness serves as relevant information
for evaluating the effectiveness of the product (Petty & Cacioppo, 1984c). Or,
a person might look to their own emotional state to provide evidence about
the merits of something (e.g., “If I don’t feel happy in your presence, I must
not love you”). Just as source, recipient, and other factors can serve as per-
suasive arguments in the appropriate context, features of the persuasive
message can serve as peripheral cues. A peripheral cue is a feature of the
persuasion context that allows favorable or unfavorable attitude formation
even in the absence of an effortful consideration of the true merits of the
object or issue. Thus, just as source factors such as how expert or attractive
the source is (Chaiken, 1980; Petty, Cacioppo, & Goldman, 1981; Petty,
Cacioppo, & Schumann, 1983) can serve as peripheral cues when motivation
or ability to think are low, so too can the mere number of arguments in the
message (Aaker & Maheswaran, 1997; Alba & Marmorstein, 1987; Petty &
Cacioppo, 1984a) and the length of the arguments used (Wood, Kallgren, &
Priesler, 1985; see also Petty, Wheeler, & Bizer, 1999).

Summary. The ELM holds that as the likelihood of elaboration is
increased (as determined by factors such as the personal relevance of the
message and the number of times it is repeated), the perceived quality of
the issue-relevant information presented becomes a more important
determinant of persuasion. Effortful evaluation of this information can
proceed in a relatively objective or a relatively biased fashion, however.
As the elaboration likelihood is decreased, peripheral cues become more
important in determining any attitude change that occurs. That is, when
the elaboration likelihood is high, the central route to persuasion domi-
nates, but when the elaboration likelihood is low, the peripheral route
takes precedence (see Petty, 1994; Petty & Wegener, 1999, for additional
discussion of the operation of central and peripheral processes along the
elaboration likelihood continuum). 5

5 As we have noted previously, the accumulated research on persuasion has pointed to
many variables that can be used to either increase or decrease the amount of thinking about
a persuasive message, and render that thinking relatively favorable or unfavorable.
Although we have focused on motivational and ability variables that can be modified by
external means (e.g., including rhetorical questions in a message to increase thinking about
the arguments), other determinants of motivation and ability to process a message are dis-
positional (e.g., people high in “need for cognition” tend to chronically engage in and enjoy
thinking, Cacioppo & Petty, 1982; Cacioppo, Petty, Feinstein, & Jarvis, 1996).