Belief change and its determinants in a regional setting

Abstract

A modification of the Osgood-Tannenbaum sociopsychological model of belief change is applied to University of Cincinnati student perceptions of Southwest Ohio and of the Kentucky Bluegrass. Students scale their beliefs about the two regions; after a week, they are given a factual presentation associating the two regions and asked to again scale their beliefs. The variable which proves most important in the resultant belief changes for the Kentucky Bluegrass is the separation of the two regions on a student's initial belief scale, suggesting the willingness of the students to believe the new information. Further analysis indicates that although objective differences in the regions affect initial beliefs, they play a negligible role in the degree to which students change their beliefs. A "halo effect" is also discovered, in which beliefs not mentioned in the presentation change in predictable directions. The empirical results appear encouraging to recent efforts which have been made to change popular impressions about places.