Do Messages about Health Risks Threaten the Self? Increasing the Acceptance of Threatening Health Messages Via Self-Affirmation

Abstract

Two stud ies dem on strate that self-image main te nance pro cesses affect the accep tance of per son ally rel e vant health mes sages. Participants who com pleted a self-affir ma tion were less defen sive and more accept ing of health infor ma tion. In Study 1, female par tic i pants (high vs. low rel e vance) read an arti cle link ing caffeine con sump tion to breast can cer. High-rel e vance women rejected the infor ma tion more than did low-rel e vance women; how ever, affirmed high-rel e vance women accepted the infor mation and intended to change their behav ior accord ingly. In Study 2, sex u ally active par tic i pants viewed an AIDS edu cational video; affirmed par tic i pants saw them selves at greater risk for HIV and pur chased con doms more often than did nonaffirmed par tic i pants. Results sug gest that health mes sages can threaten an indi vid ual's self-image and that self-affirm ing tech niques can increase the effec tive ness of health infor ma tion and lead to pos i tive health behav iors. Au thors' Note: We would like to thank Heejung S. Kim, Devra Kupor, Geoffrey Co hen, and Kelli Keough for their feed back through out the pro ject and Eric D. Knowles, Em ily Pronin, and Da vid Fetherstonhaugh for com ment ing on ear lier ver sions of this ar ti cle. We would also like to thank Lauren Puryear and Ed ward Carstensen for serv ing as ex per iment ers in this re search, Shelly Chaiken for pro vid ing the ma te ri als for Study 1, and Jeffrey Fisher for pro vid ing the AIDS ed u ca tional video used in Study 2. This re search was funded by a Stan ford Uni ver sity Grad u ate Re search Op por tu nities Grant and a Stan ford Uni ver sity Un der grad u ate Re search Op por tu nities Grant. Da vid A. K. Sherman was sup ported by a Na tional Sci ence Foun da tion Predoctoral Fel lowship while con duct ing this re search. Por tions of this ar ti cle were presented at the 1998 West ern Psy cho log i cal As so ci a tion con fer ence in Al bu quer que, New Mex ico. Leif D. Nel son now at tends Prince ton University. Cor re spon dence con cern ing this ar ti cle should be ad dressed to Da vid A. K. Sherman, who is now at the De part ment of Psy chol ogy, Uni ver sity of Cal i for nia,

The moderating impact of self‐esteem on self‐affirmation effects

“…This study found that self-affirmed participants who were frequent caffeine consumers rated the health-risk information as more convincing and reported greater perceptions of behavioural control in relation to decreasing caffeine consumption, compared to their non-affirmed counterparts. Similarly, Sherman, Nelson & Steele (2000) found that self-affirmed, frequent caffeine consumers reported greater acceptance and less criticism of a message detailing a link between caffeine consumption and breast cancer risk, together with more positive intentions to reduce their caffeine consumption, compared to their non-affirmed counterparts. Furthermore, Klein, Harris, Ferrer & Zajac (2011, study 2) demonstrated that after exposure to message outlining a link between caffeine consumption and breast cancer risk, selfaffirmed frequent caffeine consumers reported increased levels of vulnerability to breast cancer and more positive intentions to reduce their caffeine intake, compared to their non-affirmed counterparts.…”

“…Such defensive responses can potentially limit the efficacy of health promotion campaigns. Indeed, research has frequently reported that individuals who are at greatest risk of engaging in health-detrimental behaviours, i.e., those whom the health promotion campaigns are targeting, are the ones who are most likely to respond defensively to personally relevant health-risk information (Block & Williams, 2006;Good & Abraham, 2007;Keller, 1999;Sherman, Nelson & Steele, 2000;van Riet & Ruiter, 2011).…”

“…Specifically, in regard to the capacity of selfaffirmation to influence evaluation of personally relevant health-risk messages, studies have reported that self-affirmation can lead to more positive perceptions of message quality (van Koningsbruggen, Das & Roskos-Ewoldsen, 2009), higher ratings of how convincing the message is (Reed & Aspinwall, 1998), reduced levels of derogation of the message (Jessop, Simmonds & Sparks, 2009) and less critical evaluations of the message (Sherman, Nelson & Steele, 2000).…”

“…Current campaigns often highlight the risks of either engaging in unhealthy behaviours (e.g., smoking) or failing to engage in healthy behaviours (e.g., exercise). However, research findings suggest that the recipients of such campaigns may respond by derogating the message (Freeman, Hennessy & Marzullo, 2001) and frequently remain unpersuaded of the need to change (Keller, 1999;Liberman & Chaiken, 1992;van Riet & Ruiter, 2011;Sherman, Nelson & Steele, 2000). This tendency to respond defensively to personally relevant health-risk information comprises a salient threat to the efficacy of health promotion campaigns.…”

“…Indeed, previous research has frequently demonstrated the apparent tendency for individuals to respond defensively to personally relevant health-risk information (Freeman, Hennessy & Marzullo, 2001: Liberman & Chaiken, 1992van Riet & Ruiter, 2011;Sherman, Nelson & Steele, 2000). Critically, however, selfaffirmation theory further suggests that bolstering self-integrity in an important selfrelated domain can counteract such defensive responses, as global feelings of selfintegrity remain intact and, hence, the individual is less motivated to respond to the threatening information in a defensive manner.…”