The Utility of Exemplars in Persuasive Communications

Abstract

Media accounts typically employ two types of information: (a) general statements about the range or importance of a problem (base-rate information), and (b) illustrative individual cases (exemplars) that are less valid but more vivid. A review of the psychological literature on judgments leads to the general hypothesis that the perception of a problem is influenced primarily by the quality and distribution of exemplars. In a series of five experiments, the researchers varied the number and quality of exemplars and their consistency with the base-rate information for several journalistic stories. The results indicate that base-rate information had almost no impact whereas exemplars had a strong effect on the perceived distribution of public opinion about story problems. Exemplars also had a moderate impact on subjects' personal opinions about the problem. Implications for communication research and journalistic practice are discussed.

Beyond Vox Pop: The Role of News Sourcing and Political Beliefs in Exemplification Effects

“…Lefevere, DeSwert, and Walgrave (2012) defined this type of interview as "people without any specific representative function or expertise who appear to be randomly picked" (p. 103). The seeming randomness of these interviews and the absence of professional credentials and expertise likely contribute to the perception that these interviews represent the thoughts of everyday Americans; it is thus unsurprising that scholars use the vox pop format to test news media exemplification effects (e.g., Brosius & Bathelt, 1994;Daschmann, 2000;Perry & Gonzenbach, 1997).…”

“…Finally, studies in news media exemplification have focused on perceptions of public opinion on a specific issue such as apple wine (Brosius & Bathelt, 1994), school prayer in the classroom (Perry & Gonzenbach, 1997), and support for a political party (Daschmann, 2000). Although these studies establish that audiences infer public opinion on an issue from the same issue discussed in a news story, it remains unclear if audiences generalize public opinion on one issue to other issues; that is, whether perceptions of a conservative attitude on one issue is associated with perceiving that the public is more conservative in general.…”

“…In terms of media effects, an exemplification effect occurs when "the attributes of known individual members generalize to the category as a whole" (Rothbart, 1996, p. 307). Although studies in news media exemplification find that people interviewed in a news article can affect perceptions of public opinion (e.g., Brosius & Bathelt, 1994;Daschmann, 2000;Gan, Hill, Pschernig, & Zillmann, 1996;Perry & Gonzenbach, 1997), actual empirical work on this process is limited.…”

“…In explaining exemplification effects, media scholars generally refer to Tversky and Kahneman's (1974) availability heuristic (e.g., Daschmann, 2000;Zillmann & Brosius, 2000) as well as the ratio of exemplar opinions (e.g., Brosius & Bathelt, 1994). Consequently, little attention has been given to whether exemplification effects might be affected by the characteristics of the exemplars themselves, or the audiences that consume them.…”

The problem of causality in cultivation research

“…To illustrate, we can consider, along with the above findings, the fact that specific examples play a role in cultivation (Brosius and Bathelt, 1994;Zillmann and Brosius, 2000;Daschmann, 2001). These examples are brief, authentic statements by agents or victims involved in actual situations.…”