Page 54 - The Handbook of Persuasion and Social Marketing

Social Psychological Foundations of Social Marketing 47

secure children’s education and prevent more children from failing”).
Cesario and colleagues (2004) found that participants who were chroni-
cally promotion focused were more persuaded by the message that em-
phasized gains, and participants who were chronically prevention focused
were more persuaded by the message that emphasized the negatives that
would be avoided. As might be expected by now, this simple main effect of
matching is not the only result that can occur. Interested readers should
consult Cesario, Higgins, and Scholer (2008) for the multiple roles this
type of matching can induce.

Social Hierarchy and Warmth Versus Competence Appeals

Dubois, Rucker, and Galinsky (2014) recently proposed a relationship
between an audience’s position in the social hierarchy and information
related to warmth versus competence. Specifically, they proposed that in-
dividuals high in the social hierarchy were more sensitive to and focused
on information related to competence because being at the top of a hierar-
chy creates a more agency- and self-focused means of thinking (Rucker,
Galinsky & Dubois, 2012). In contrast, they proposed that individuals low
in the social hierarchy were more sensitive to and focused on information
related to warmth because being lower in the social hierarchy creates a
more communal and other-focused means of thinking. As a consequence,
information related to competence could be viewed as a better argument
to them than information related to warmth.
To test this idea, Dubois and colleagues measured people’s perceived
social standing and their willingness to give money to a charity that fea-
tured characteristics associated with competence (e.g., skillful, competent,
and capable) or characteristics associated with warmth (e.g., warm, trust-
worthy, and good-natured). Dubois and colleagues found that as partici-
pants’ position in the social hierarchy increased, they were willing to
donate more money to an organization associated with competence but
less to an organization associated with warmth.
In a second experiment, Dubois and colleagues (2014) replicated the
results by examining natural variations in people’s power and associations
with the source of a message. Specifically, Aaker, Vohs, and Mogilner
(2010) demonstrated that “.com” companies were perceived as more com-
petent but less warm than “.org” companies. Building on Aaker and col-
leagues’ finding, Dubois and colleagues (2014) found that individuals who
occupied positions of power at work (i.e., report their job to be that of a
boss) were more persuaded by a message that came from a “.com” com-
pany as opposed to a “.org” company.