Biased Optimism and the Third-Person Effect

Abstract

While the third-person effect has proved to be a persistent and robust finding, most research on this phenomenon has employed media stimuli with potentially harmful consequences for its audience. We hypothesized that underlying the third-person phenomenon is a human tendency to see the world through optimistic or self-serving lenses. Such an optimistic bias predicts that people will estimate greater media effects on others than on themselves for messages with harmful outcomes, but no difference in effect for beneficial messages.It's a sentiment we often express -"most people believe anything they see in print." But most of us do not mean to include ourselves in this observation about "most people." Susceptibility to the influence of mass media is a quality we ascribe readily to others, but rarely to ourselves.This disparity between the perceived influence of media on oneself and others has been labeled the third-person effect. The first paper detailing this hypothesis reported on four modest experiments,l all suggesting that people think such media fare as political campaigning or television commercials will influence others more than themselves.A growing body of both experimental and field research has corroborated this hypothesis. The third-person phenomenon is a robust finding. It varies among individuals, but it has appeared with compelling consistency across studies.One unanswered question is whether the tendency to estimate greater media influence on others is universal. If it is not, then contingent conditions for the third-person effect may help explain why the phenomenon occurs. Thus, in this research we set out to find conditions that would determine the presence or absence of the third-person phenomenon. Our first task was a search for common elements in previous studies.It is quickly apparent that the message context used in most thirdperson effect research does not serve an audience's self-interest. That is, Journalivm Quarterly VoL 70, No. 1 spring 1983 58-67 81993 AEJMC Albert Cunther is professor in the Department of AgrfcuJtuml]ournaJism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Paul Mundy is a communication specialist with the International Institute for RumJ Reconstruction in the Philippines. They would like to thank Woyd Bostian and Kurt Neuwirth for assistance.

Examining the effectiveness of physical threats in road safety advertising: The role of the third-person effect, gender, and age

“…Consistent with previous research (e.g., Duck & Mullin, 1995;Gunther & Mundy, 1993), the resultant TPE score was calculated by subtracting the score obtained for "Perceived influence on yourself" from the score obtained for "Perceived influence on other drivers in general". Since both of these ratings were measured on a 7-point scale ranging from Not influenced at all [1] to Extremely influenced [7], the third-person differential perception score created, could range from -6 to 6 with positive scores denoting greater perceived influence on others than self (i.e., a classic TPE) and negative scores denoting greater perceived influence on self than others (i.e., a reverse TPE).…”

Online Gambling Advertising and the Third-Person Effect

“…As optimistic bias has been suggested as a process underlying TPE (Gunther and Mundy, 1993;Salwen and Dupagne, 2003). Consequently, participants were asked for the perceived likelihood as suffering from gambling problems relating to others and themselves ("Do you think you're exposed to suffering gambling addiction?"…”

“…A large number of scholarly works have found support for the perceptual component of the TPE in a great variety of contexts, such as pornography (Gunther, 1995), controversial advertising (Shah, Faber and Youn, 1999), political advertising (Meirick, 2004), and online gaming (Zhong, 2009). TPE usually emerges in the context of undesirable messages, and vanishes (Gunther and Mundy, 1993), or reverses (the so-called First-Person Effect) when the message is perceived as desirable (Eveland and McLeod, 1999). Some of the suggested psychological processes underlying TPE are optimistic bias (Gunther and Mundy, 1993;Salwen and Dupagne, 2003), ego involvement (Perloff, 1989), and social comparison (Atwood, 1994).…”

“…TPE usually emerges in the context of undesirable messages, and vanishes (Gunther and Mundy, 1993), or reverses (the so-called First-Person Effect) when the message is perceived as desirable (Eveland and McLeod, 1999). Some of the suggested psychological processes underlying TPE are optimistic bias (Gunther and Mundy, 1993;Salwen and Dupagne, 2003), ego involvement (Perloff, 1989), and social comparison (Atwood, 1994). Social distance (Brosius and Engel, 1996), education (Paul et al, 2000), age, gender, racial group, and group identity (Hoffner and Rehkoff, 2011) have been shown as factors that impact on the TPE discrepancy.…”

Henriksen and Flora (1999) Revisited—A Literature Review on Third-Person Effects and Children/Adolescents

“…The common denominator in these studies is that preteens have been chosen, because social identity is an important explanations for third-person perception (Duck, Hogg, & Terry, 1999;Gunther & Mundy, 1993;Gunther & Thorson, 1992), and the preteen is the age when social identity and social behavior developments are especially observable (Scharrer & Leone, 2006, p. 262). The focus on social identity and behavior is expressed by studies of how peer norms can exert especially forceful influence on adolescents.…”