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British Journal of Social Psychology (2014) © 2014 The British Psychological Society www.wileyonlinelibrary.com

Brief report

Are anthropomorphic persuasive appeals effective? The role of the recipient’s motivations Kim-Pong Tam* Division of Social Science, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong Anthropomorphic persuasive appeals are prevalent. However, their effectiveness has not been well studied. The present research addresses this issue with two experiments in the context of environmental persuasion. It shows that anthropomorphic messages, relative to non-anthropomorphic ones, appear to motivate more conservation behaviour and elicit more favourable message responses only among recipients who have a strong need for effectance or social connection. Among recipients whose such need is weak, anthropomorphic appeals seem to backfire. These findings extend the research on motivation and persuasion and add evidence to the motivational bases of anthropomorphism. In addition, joining some recent studies, the present research highlights the implications of anthropomorphism of nature for environmental conservation efforts, and offers some practical suggestions for environmental persuasion.

By saying ‘the Earth has a fever’ in his Nobel Lecture, Al Gore likened the current condition of nature to a human ailment. Similarly, the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth likened nature to a human whose rights need to be respected. These cases illustrate the use of anthropomorphism – attribution of human characteristics to non-human entities (Epley, Waytz, & Cacioppo, 2007) – as persuasive appeals. Anthropomorphic appeals are prevalent in not only environmental messages (Waytz, Epley, & Cacioppo, 2010) but also other domains (e.g., advertising; Aggarwal & McGill, 2007). While this prevalence implies a widespread belief that these appeals work, little research has considered whether they are really effective. The present research addresses this question. By integrating findings about the relationship between motivation and persuasion and the motivations behind anthropomorphism, I will test the hypothesis that anthropomorphic appeals are effective only for message recipients who need effectance or social connection strongly.

Motivation and persuasion A message is more persuasive when its content matches the recipient’s motivational orientations (Dijkstra, 2008; Hirsh, Kang, & Bodenhausen, 2012). This messagemotivation congruency effect can be illustrated with the research on regulatory focus. Recent studies have shown that a message that is congruent with the recipient’s *Correspondence should be addressed to Kim-Pong Tam, Division of Social Science, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Hong Kong (email: [email protected]). DOI:10.1111/bjso.12076

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regulatory focus is more impactful (Cesario, Higgins, & Scholer, 2008). For instance, gain-framed advertisements elicit more positive brand attitudes for recipients with a promotion focus, whereas loss-framed messages are more effective for recipients with a prevention focus (Lee & Aaker, 2004; see also Kim, 2006; Updegraff, Sherman, Luyster, & Mann, 2007; for similar findings in the domain of health communication). Other research has identified a similar phenomenon. The functional approach to attitudes suggests that messages are more persuasive when they address the specific concerns the recipient holds (Lavine & Snyder, 1996). For example, a message can more effectively motivate individuals who want to learn useful skills to join volunteer work when it highlights the knowledge-acquisition function of volunteering (Clary et al., 1998). Similarly, political communication studies have identified the value-resonance effect, the observation that value appeals are more persuasive when they match recipients’ values (Nelson & Garst, 2005; Schemer, Wirth, & Matthes, 2012). For instance, Shen and Edwards (2005) found that an article that emphasized the need to help the disadvantaged elicited more positive attitudes towards welfare reform among readers who valued humanitarianism, whereas an article that emphasized the strict requirements on welfare recipients was more effective for readers who valued individualism. The preceding literature review suggests that persuasive messages are most effective when they connect to the needs and states of recipients. This raises a critical question about the effectiveness of anthropomorphism as a persuasive tactic, and the specific needs that this tactic might connect to. This question is discussed next.

Motivations behind anthropomorphism Two motivations underlie anthropomorphism (Epley et al., 2007). The first is the need for effectance. Many entities in this world are incomprehensible. By mapping the familiar concept of humans onto these entities, people enjoy a greater sense of mastery and control (Kennedy, 1992). Indeed, past studies have shown that individuals who need effectance, such as those who desire control over their lives, are particularly likely to anthropomorphize their pets and other animals (Epley, Waytz, Akalis, & Cacioppo, 2008). The second motivation behind anthropomorphism is the need for social connection. Through anthropomorphizing non-human entities, individuals identify surrogate relationship partners and thereby enjoy the sense of relatedness they want (Serpell, 2003). Indeed, past findings show that individuals who need connection, such as lonely individuals, are particularly likely to anthropomorphize such non-human entities as gadgets and pets (Epley, Akalis, Waytz, & Cacioppo, 2008). Given the message-motivation congruency effect discussed earlier, it seems reasonable to expect that anthropomorphic appeals are effective for recipients who need effectance or social connection strongly, which is the core hypothesis here.

The present research The present research integrates the insights from findings on the message-motivation congruency effect and the motivational bases of anthropomorphism. It is hypothesized that for recipients who need effectance or social connection strongly, persuasive messages that contain anthropomorphic appeals will be more effective than messages that do not contain anthropomorphism. How recipients who have a weak need for effectance or social connection respond is, however, an open question. On the one hand, anthropomorphic appeals may have no specific consequence for people unmotivated by

Anthropomorphism and persuasion

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effectance or social connection. On the other hand, because anthropomorphic appeals are incongruent with these people’s motivations, they may backfire. To test this hypothesis, two experiments were conducted. Experiment 1 examined the need for effectance, and Experiment 2 examined the need for social connection. In both experiments, the participants read an environmental message that contained either anthropomorphic or non-anthropomorphic appeals, and subsequently reported their intention to take conservation actions. Environmental persuasion was chosen as the focus for two reasons. First, anthropomorphic appeals are prevalent in the environmental discourse (Waytz et al., 2010); studying their effectiveness could generate practical recommendations for environmental organizations. Second, the implications of anthropomorphism of nature for environmental conservation have received much attention recently. For instance, it has been documented that people show more pro-environmental behaviour when they dispositionally anthropomorphize nature (Tam, 2013b) or are experimentally led to do so (Tam, Lee, & Chao, 2013). The present research extends these recent studies from a new angle: Can transient exposure to an anthropomorphic representation of nature also motivate conservation behaviour?

EXPERIMENT 1 The need for effectance was operationalized as the desire for control, which refers to people’s motivation to see themselves in control of their lives (Burger, 1992), and has been found to enhance anthropomorphism (Epley, Waytz, et al., 2008).

Method The participants were 314 Americans (124 males and 190 females; Mage = 31.92 and SDage = 12.07 years) recruited through Amazon’s Mechanical Turk (Buhrmester, Kwang, & Gosling, 2011). They first completed the Desirability of Control Scale (Burger, 1992), which had 20 items (e.g., ‘I enjoy having control over my destiny’), on a 5-point scale (1 = very untrue of me to 5 = very true of me; a = .81), and some filler measures. They then read an article about the environmental crisis. In the anthropomorphism condition (N = 156), the title read ‘Mr. Nature being harmed by humans’, and the text referred to nature as ‘Mr. Nature’ and used personal pronouns.1 All content was identical in the control condition (N = 158), except that the word ‘Nature’ and impersonal pronouns were used instead. The participants were randomly assigned to either condition. Subsequently, they completed two measures of the intention to perform conservation actions. The first was a 10-item scale about environmental movement participation, adopted from the Environmental Attitudes Inventory (e.g., ‘I would like to join and actively participate in an environmentalist group’; Milfont & Duckitt, 2010). The second asked the participants to report their likelihood of performing 12 green behaviours (e.g., ‘recycling things’, ‘looking for ways to reuse things’, ‘taking a shorter shower’, ‘using energy-efficient household devices’) in the future; these behaviours were adopted from past studies (e.g., Schultz & Zelezny, 1998; Tam, 2013a). Both measures used a 7-point 1

Compared to ‘Mr. Nature’, ‘Mother Nature’ is a much more popular term. A Google search conducted on 23 March 2014 identified approximately 7,190,000 entries of ‘Mother Nature’, but just 51,100 entries of ‘Mr. Nature’. Given its popularity, people may possess some pre-existing representations regarding ‘Mother Nature’. It is uncertain what types of connotations this term bears. To avoid the confounding influences of these connotations, the term ‘Mr. Nature’ was chosen.

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Table 1. Results of the MANOVAs in Experiments 1 and 2

Experiment 1 Condition Desire for control Condition 9 Desire for control Experiment 2 Condition Anxiety Avoidance Condition 9 Anxiety Condition 9 Avoidance Anxiety 9 Avoidance Condition 9 Anxiety 9 Avoidance

Wilks’ k

F

p

g2

gp2

1.00 0.93 0.98

0.01 10.95 3.59

.99

Are anthropomorphic persuasive appeals effective? The role of the recipient's motivations.

Anthropomorphic persuasive appeals are prevalent. However, their effectiveness has not been well studied. The present research addresses this issue wi...
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