After decades of research, it is clear that fear can indeed motivate positive health behaviors and that exposure to information about threat susceptibility, severity, response efficacy, and self-efficacy is key to this process. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the This is because present-oriented goals are more important than future-oriented, protection-related goals when one perceives her timeline to be limited. Visually, the EPPM is represented as a path model whereby the four message components in the external stimuli (i.e., self-efficacy, response efficacy, susceptibility, and severity) predict their related cognitive perceptions. Empirical work is needed, however, to test if and how differences between fear and anxiety manifest themselves across multiple persuasion contexts. Thus, it may be that fear appeals that emphasize efficacy over threat may be more successful for this demographic, though future research is needed to address this question directly. found that this dynamic approach offered evidence in support of a curvilinear relationship between fear and persuasion. Keywords: Fear appeals, risk, health communication, meta-analysis Fear appeals are persuasive messages that attempt to arouse fear by emphasizing the potential danger and harm that will befall individuals if they do not adopt the messages' recommendations (Dillard, 1996; Maddux & Rogers, 1983). This type of message is conveyed to frighten and arouse people into action by emphasising the serious outcome from not taking action. eCollection 2023 Mar. Through its divisions in 54 subfields of psychology and affiliations with 60 state, territorial and Canadian provincial associations, APA works to advance the creation, communication and application of psychological knowledge to benefit society and improve people's lives. The discussion establishes that fear appeal-based public health messages (i.e. An official website of the United States government. When people are aware of a threat, the aversive state of fear quickly follows. There are multiple explanations for this need to share, including the need to verbalize experiences to help make sense of them, to help validate the self or confirm that people are still themselves despite this event, and to allow groups to develop collective social knowledge of emotional experiences. To aid health professionals in redirecting away from the use of fear appeals, we offer a phased approach to creating health communication messages during the COVID-19 crisis. Using a within-subjects design and asking participants about their fear responses before, during, and after viewing a message about colorectal cancer screening using, Dillard et al. Fear appeals are also used in educational settings. Although no new models of fear appeals have specifically been advanced since the EPPM, theorists have considered how a range of emotions, including fear, might generate persuasive effect. In essence, the fear depicted in the message is so great that rather than deal with it, people stop listening, viewing, or reading it. The use of fear in public health campaigns has been controversial for decades. There is a maximum effective value of fear. Psychological Bulletin, 141, 11781204. Health persuasion through emoji: How emoji interacted with information source to predict health behaviors in COVID-19 situation. Given that theories of motivation were losing favor to those that focused on cognition in the field of psychology in the 1970s, it is unsurprising that the next major advance in fear appeal theorizing focused on the cognitive elements associated with fear appeal effectiveness. Further, many of the 12 propositions originally articulated within the EPPM have not been consistently tested. doi: 10.4045/tidsskr.20.0346. Although little attention has been given to how specific personality traits impact reactions to fear appeals, there are good reasons to believe that they matter and should be looked at more carefully in the future. Rather, news stories frequently highlight new health threats for which there are no clear solutions yet, leaving the audience to come up with their own ideas on how to best protect themselves. public health messages that emphasise the consequences of failing to engage in a particular health behaviour) have two components (1) perceived threat and (2) perceived efficacy. Evidence from a meta-analysis of fear appeals found that appeals targeting female-dominated audiences are more effective than those targeting male audiences, likely because women tend to be more prevention focused in that they are more sensitive to avoiding negative outcomes than to seeking positive outcomes (Tannenbaum et al., 2015). Further, individual differences have been considered to determine who is most likely to experience fear during and after message consumption. Epub 2020 Mar 26. Maslows so-called "hierarchy of needs"is often presented as a five-level pyramid where the bottom four levels are "deficiency needs.". For example. However, more recent theorizing has returned to a focus on the influence that the emotion of fear itself has on attitude and behavior change. For example, we may learn that taking too much over-the-counter pain medication can cause liver damage; nevertheless, we continue to take more than we should when the pain is great. At a methodological level, many studies of fear appeals fail to measure the emotion of fear itself as an outcome, instead analyzing only threat and efficacy cognitions. In an early test of this model, Janis and Feshbach (1953) examined the connection between fear arousal and the persuasiveness of dental-hygiene messages. sharing sensitive information, make sure youre on a federal Tannenbaum et al. As OKeefe (2003) argues, it is important to differentiate between message features and message effects, and if researchers are to gain a deeper understanding of the mechanisms behind fear appeal effects and the specific role that the emotion of fear plays in this process, they need to clearly distinguish not only message features from their psychological effects but also emotional responses from cognitive ones. There are very few circumstances under which they are not effective and there are no identifiable circumstances under which they backfire and lead to undesirable outcomes, said Dolores Albarracin, PhD, professor of psychology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and an author of the study, published in the journal Psychological Bulletin. Next, these cognitive perceptions form a feedback loop with fear, as well as interact with each other to either predict protection motivation (which then predicts message acceptance) or defensive motivation (which then predicts message rejection). Effects are most apparent in women and for one-time behaviors, says study. Copy this link, or click below to email it to a friend. Reviewed by Lybi Ma. However, if a person focuses on controlling the emotion of fear, fear control processes are engaged, which ultimately result in maladaptive outcomes, such as avoidance, denial, and reactance. Empirical research, however, did not readily support the predicted curvilinear relationship between fear arousal and influence. Fear appeals, also known as scare tactics, have been widely used to promote recommended preventive behaviors. "One is seats, one is . Rooted in appraisal theories of emotions (e.g., Lazarus, 1991), the EFM argues that when a message contains information that is relevant to an emotions core relational theme, or the essential perception that underlies an emotional experience, that particular emotion is aroused. This Perspective discusses the use of fear appeals in promoting health behaviour. Despite accumulating evidence that fear appeals could be persuasive, the field remained without a good explanation for the mechanisms of these message effects. Psychological and behavioral responses to the declaration of COVID-19 as a pandemic: A comparative study of Hong Kong, Singapore, and the U.S. NCI CPTC Antibody Characterization Program. Still, the CFM introduces the notion that the emotion of fear influences how carefully persuasive messages are processed, which in turn has implications for the direction and endurance of persuasive effect. DOI: 10.1002/ijop.12042, Tannenbaum, M. B., Hepler, J., Zimmerman, R. S., Saul, L., Jacobs, S., Wilson, K., & Albarracin, D. (2015). Answer: Fear appeal is simply a message (most commonly found in advertising) which is intended to bring fear to its audience; They either encourage or discourage their audience from participating in a specific behavior. Thus, it may be that blunters may respond better to shorter, more direct fear appeals whereas monitors may be more willing to engage with longer or more detailed fear-inducing messages. With strong evolutionary roots, fear serves important functions, including alerting people to present threats and motivating action to avoid future threats. This body of work suggests that, in general, women report being afraid of more items or events and having more severe fear reactions to frightening items or events than men. Print 2020 Jun 30. Further, the threat coverage was frequently sensationalistic, with more than half of stories referring to pandemic, outbreak, or death in ways disproportionate to the actual threat. Although these meta-analyses seem to converge on a small but significant relationship between fear and persuasion-related outcomes, the mechanisms of fear appeal effects are still not entirely clear. Fear appeals are often used in public health service announcements and health behavior change campaigns. For example, the core relational theme of fear is imminent threat. However, this approach offers a limited understanding of the experience of fear throughout message exposure. Fear produces a significant though small amount of change across the board. Mongeaus (1998) meta-analysis examined the influence of fear appeals on perceived fear, attitudes, and behaviors. a fear appeal message is the amount of fear it is intended to arouse in message recipients. Some recent studies have examined the structure of health news in ways that speak to the link between emotional arousal, most notably fear, and persuasive outcomes. Hovland, Janis, and Kelly noted that habituated behaviors can be adaptive in that they target the threat itself and aim to reduce or eliminate it. However, there is mixed evidence as to trait anxietys impact on fear appeal effects. Fear. They can also sometimes be found through online scholarly search engines, such as Google Scholar, PubMed, or the American Psychological Associations PsycNET website. Book chapters that discuss fears role in communication and media processes and effects also provide helpful overviews of the state of the literature as well as suggestions for future research directions. In a similar analysis, messages that included severity (d = .23) or susceptibility (d = .43) or both (d = .39) had stronger effects on outcomes than messages that did not include these threat components (d = .12). From children and adolescents to young adults, middle-aged individuals, and finally the elderly, using diverse samples with wide age ranges or investing in long-term cohort and longitudinal studies may help reveal potential differences in fear-arousal and fear appeal effects across developmental stage. For example, Myrick and Oliver (2015) found that feeling fearful after watching a YouTube public-service announcement about skin cancer was a positive predictor of intentions to share the video with others. One Personality Trait Predicts Longevity More Than OthersBut Why? This journal article, as well as other journal articles, can be found in scholarly databases available via most university libraries. Discover the world's . Paul Mongeau also addresses the history and current state of the fear appeal literature in his chapter of the second edition of The Sage Handbook of Persuasion: Developments in Theory and Practice. Despite the wealth of research on the effects of fear-based messages, numerous limitations have been pointed out in the existing literature. Unauthorized use of these marks is strictly prohibited. Thus, in this context, the emphasis is on how existing fear or anxiety may be minimized by the providers communication style rather than the providers communication being the stimulus for fear. Med Anthropol. Although these are presented in chronological order here, it is important to note that the evolution of fear appeal theorizing reflects a combination of attempts to build on previous theory alongside overarching changes in psychological research that shifted from motivation-based approaches to more cognitively oriented approaches starting in the 1970s (for a review, see Nabi, 2007). It generally describes a strategy for motivating people to take a particular action. | People cope with potentially threatening information in different ways. Recent research, however, is beginning to more carefully consider how the emotions associated with health messages promote information-sharing behaviors. Fear-appeal research has focused almost exclusively on mediated messages. 2023 Feb 7;20(4):2896. doi: 10.3390/ijerph20042896. Moreover, they may perceive themselves to be less able to avoid the harms associated with risky health behaviors (Cohn, Macfarlane, Yanez, & Imai, 1995). Further, there is evidence that campaigns targeting adolescents risky health behaviors are at high risk for failure due to the likelihood of reactance, or resistance to having behavioral choices controlled by others. Another individual difference that may influence reactions to fear appeals is monitoring versus blunting responses to information (S. M. Miller, 1987). Yet fears associated motivation for protection from the threat may still lead to message processing, depending on the audiences expectations regarding the remainder of the message content. Additionally, Tannenbaum et al. These appeals are effective at changing attitudes, intentions and behaviors. Warnings about the unwanted consequences of smoking, texting while driving, and drinking while pregnant can be considered fear appeals. Horror movies use sound to frighten audiences. Conversely, the frequent use of fear appeals across a range of issues could possibly result in a chronic sense of heightened anxiety. In light of findings like these, Janis (1967) later argued that the relationship between the elicitation of fear and adoption of the target behavior would be an inverted U-shaped curve. Although the predicted interaction between threat and efficacy appraisals lies at the heart of the EPPM, the full model includes 12 propositions detailing numerous intricate relationships between the different types of cognitions, fear, and message effectiveness (Witte, 1992). Fear appeals are a form of persuasive communication. Printed from Oxford Research Encyclopedias, Communication. The following study examines social facilitation of eating cues in anti-obesity fear appeals to determine . FOIA Key elements: statement with values and philosophy related to the problem, description of target population to be served, specific services/intervention to be used and why, statement of desired public image Goal -Long-term direction for the program, overall intent or desired outcomes, written in general terms (no specifics) A review of the literature on more general gender differences in fear may also help explain potential gender differences in responses to fear appeals. Indeed, Nabi and Prestin (2016) conducted experimental research to examine the influence of the structure of news stories that incorporated fear. He says there are three ways to look at the local elections. The information bombardment on social media is loaded with them. A student interested in the historical roots of fear appeal theorizing could start with seminal pieces from Carl Hovlands Yale research group, including the 1953 book by Hovland, Janis, and Kelly titled Communication and Persuasion: Psychological Studies of Opinion Change, as well as later journal articles reporting empirical data related to fear appeals. 2020 Summer;32(2):221-228. doi: 10.24869/psyd.2020.221. However, if efficacy appraisals are strong enough to dominate threat appraisals, the EPPM predicts that individuals will feel capable of addressing the threat and will then enact adaptive, danger-control behaviors. More specifically, the EPPM argues that if a message contains information on threat severity and susceptibility, fear will be aroused. The link was not copied. As such, monitors and blunters may respond differently to fear appeal messages. Given personality traits influence perceptions of events, and given emotions are based on such perceptions, personality traits could influence whether or not a fear appeal is likely to evoke fear, to what degree, and toward what end. There has been so much written about fear and the role of fear in risk-related messages that one can get easily overwhelmed with the voluminous responses to search queries for the terms. However, cautionary tales, which tell the stories of people who ignore the dangers of a forbidden act and suffer as a result, have frequently been used to encourage compliant behavior in children (P. J. Miller & Moore, 1989). Fear, in turn, motivates protective behavior and a strong desire to escape the threat. government site. In such situations, they might also criticize the nature of the message and then use self-justification for not modifying their attitudes and behavior; especially, if they discuss the fear appeals with others (Goldenbeld, Twisk, & Houwing, 2007). Throughout the history of the study of fear appeals, any message that evoked negative emotion would often be categorized as a fear appeal. Advancing psychology to benefit society and improve lives. This theoretical perspective also argues that older individuals have better memory for positive information than for negative information, suggesting that the threat component of fear appeals may not be as memorable as the efficacy component for this particular audience. This is a critical because if audiences stop paying attention to a fear appeal after the presentation of the threat, they may miss out on the efficacy information that is critical to a fear-based messages success. Socioemotional selectivity theory argues that the elderly and the terminally ill are more likely to pay attention to positive information than to negative information (Carstensen, Fung, & Charles, 2003). Fear, information and control during a pandemic. Although not specifically documented, the pervasiveness and endurance of cautionary tales in childrens literature suggest that such narratives are believed to be influential; and in light of the growing evidence of the persuasive influence of narratives on adults (Green, 2006; Green & Brock, 2000), there is reason to believe such stories do, indeed, have the desired influence on children. More elaborate strategies, such as training people on the skills they will need to succeed in changing behavior, will likely be more effective in most contexts. She noted that the studies analyzed did not necessarily compare people who were afraid to people who were unafraid, but instead compared groups that were exposed to more or less fear-inducing content. Many studies on the effectiveness of fear appeals have been conducted. Based on the literature and existing theory spanning from children to the elderly, we suggest that though fear-based messages may be useful to address health issues across the lifespan, there are unique challenges to consider for each age group. That is, adolescents may not perceive themselves to be less vulnerable to risk as much as they actually perceive a range of health-threatening behaviors as less risky than they actually are, compared to their adult counterparts. Monitors, however, responded to both message types similarly. In this article, we discuss the use of fear appeals during the COVID-19 pandemic and the potential negative sociobehavioral outcomes fear-based messaging may have. Whereas some . Multiple book chapters also provide nice overviews of the existing research on the emotion of fear. (2015) calculated an average weighted effect size comparing groups exposed to moderate fear versus those exposed to high depicted fear. If the linear fear-persuasion hypothesis supported by the Mongeau (1998) and Witte and Allen (2000) meta-analyses, were the superior model of fear appeal effects, this value would be positive and significant. The fear-as-acquired drive model (often referred to as the drive model) argues that stimuli that evoke fear result in a drive to avoid the unpleasant emotional state (Hovland, Janis, & Kelly, 1953). Some individuals, known as monitors, tend to experience more anxiety and prefer more, rather than less, information about health threats; whereas blunters instead avoid information related to threats. Individuals base their first appraisal on assessment of The protection motivation theory (Maddux & Rogers, 1983; Rogers, 1975) elaborated on the danger-control branch of the PPM, explicating four different cognitive reactions to fear appeals. Such research would, in turn, help determine what message structures would be best suited for which age groups and within what health contexts. Importantly, Witte and Allen (2000) did not find support for the EPPMs predicted threat by efficacy interaction. crisis communication; emergency; global health; health communications; risk. Given that fear appeals are designed to evoke powerful emotional responses, it is reasonable to surmise that such messages may be the source of social sharing, both through interpersonal discussion and social media posting or commenting. Nat Med. However, despite anecdotal evidence that physicians communication may trigger fear in patients for the purpose of motivating behavior change or compliance, the intentional use of fear-based messages in the clinical context has not received attention in the academic literature. Although the distinction between the two has not been studied empirically, and the word anxious is frequently included among the emotion words used to assess fear responses to persuasive appeals, it is useful to recognize that the experience of fear and anxiety are distinguishable, with fear carrying the potential for more adaptive action. This raises the question of how gender-role socialization may influence how men, in particular, respond to fear appeals in terms of experienced fear versus reported fear, and the implications for both message design and application. Indeed, the Tannenbaum et al. So, if an audience member appraises a message as representing an imminent threat to her own well-being, she will likely experience fear. How 'fear appeals' and disinformation may be manipulating the public on COVID Communication by public health officials during a pandemic may involve an organized strategy that includes some. Further, of the studies that do measure fear, they tend to do so in very limited ways, typically self-report of emotional arousal in response to the message generally. Psychiatry for Better World: COVID-19 and Blame Games People Play from Public and Global Metal Health Perspective. Though conceptually appealing, the PPM did not specify when individuals were more likely to rely on fear-control or danger-control processes. These emotions may also have an effect on behavioral changes. Arne hmans chapter on fear and anxiety in the third edition of the Handbook of Emotions provides a helpful overview of the biological and psychological underpinnings of the study of fear and its influence on cognition and behavior. More important, said Albarracin, there was no evidence in the meta-analysis that fear appeals backfired to produce a worse outcome relative to a control group. As such, message components of fear appeals include threat and efficacy. The recently advanced emotional flow perspective (Nabi, 2015; Nabi & Green, 2015) builds on this recognition by arguing that messages, including fear appeals, evoke multiple emotions in sequence as the contents of the messages unfold. Fear appeal is a typical marketing strategy that aims to affect behavior by inducing anxiety in individuals who are exposed to a frightening message. Fear and Understanding in the Time of COVID-19. messages are often used in political, public health, and advertising campaigns in the hopes of reducing risky attitudes, intentions, or behaviors, their use is often a polarizing issue. In addition to fear appeals that purposefully aim to scare audiences to motivate attitude and behavior change, recent work suggests that fear can be generated by other forms of messages (e.g., news accounts, social media posts, interpersonal conversations) that may influence receivers approaches to health issues. There are many messages that convey important information about potential harm; however, if the . For example, in a study of fear appeals about condom use and AIDS prevention, Witte and Morrison (2000) found that whereas trait anxiety was not related to threat perceptions, efficacy perceptions, or behavior, participants low in trait anxiety reported greater defensive avoidance than did those high in trait anxiety. It's frequently used in public health campaigns such as anti-smoking, anti-drunk driving, and hypertension awareness campaigns. explains the conditions under which fear appeals are likely to succeed. Six children were among the dead after a Russian missile attack on Uman; Russian soldiers are likely being placed in improvised cells consisting of holes in the ground as punishment, the UK's MoD . Such curvilinear patterns likely result from minimal fear in response to the beginning of a message, stronger fear when an individual sees the threat component of the message, and resolving fear after seeing the efficacy component. Your current browser may not support copying via this button. PLoS One. The emotional flow perspective suggests that the threat information results in fear arousal, and the efficacy information is associated with feelings of hope. However, trait anxiety has been linked to other outcomes of fear appeals. Which can you control and which can you not? The results replicated previous meta-analyses, demonstrating a significant positive relationship between fear appeal manipulations and attitudes, intentions, and behaviors (average weighted d = .29). Yet, there is a growing body of literature on the social sharing of emotions that indicates that people have an instinctive need to disclose to others when they experience emotionally charged events, which has been widely documented across cultures, gender, and age groups (Rim, 2009). The physical experience of fear is generated by an extensive network of fear-related neural structures in the brain, particularly the amygdala (Lang, Davis, & hman, 2000; hman, 2008). Care, however, should be taken not to stigmatize or exhibit bias regarding the audience; doing so could possibly backfire. For generations of health educators, public health campaigns around health issues emphasized positive messages and highlighted . 2020 Jul;39(5):376-379. doi: 10.1080/01459740.2020.1745481. Under the terms of the licence agreement, an individual user may print out a single article for personal use (for details see Privacy Policy and Legal Notice). There are many messages that convey important information about potential harm; however, if the . A campaign with gruesome photos of a person dying of lung cancer to combat smoking might make people think twice . That is, though significant relationships between fear and persuasion have been identified, meta-analyses have found mixed support for the threat by efficacy interactions predicted by the EPPM (de Hoog, Stroebe, & de Wit, 2007; Witte & Allen, 2000). All close relationships can elicit strong positive and negative emotions the parties have of one another. Most directly relevant, Goodall, Sabo, Cline, and Egbert (2012) conducted a content analysis of print and electronic news coverage of the H1N1 virus from a fear appeal perspective, looking for the appearance of threat and efficacy information within the news coverage. Participants read news stories designed to evoke either fear or hope about the human papilloma virus (HPV) and with different levels of response efficacy information regarding the impending HPV vaccine.

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