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Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 38, 137143 (2002) doi:10.1006/jesp.2001.1492, available online at http://www.idealibrary.

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The Inuence of Accessibility of Source Likability on Persuasion


David R. Roskos-Ewoldsen
University of Alabama

Jacqueline Bichsel
Pennsylvania State University, Harrisburg

and Kathleen Hoffman


University of Alabama Received May 5, 2000; revised April 24, 2001; accepted April 24, 2001; published online August 3, 2001 Earlier research found that increasing the accessibility of a sources likability from memory results in greater agreement with a message attributed to that source. Three explanations were proposed for that earlier nding. Accessible liking toward the source of a message may result in increased likelihood of (a) biased central processing, (b) using a likability heuristic, or (c) motivated central processing. This experiment demonstrated that when the message is counterattitudinal and included weak arguments, participants were more likely to critically scrutinize the message as the accessibility of the sources likability increased from memory. As a consequence, attributing the message to a likable source reduced the persuasiveness of the message. 2001 Elsevier Science (USA)

The likability of a source of a message can be conceptualized as an attitude. In other words, when individuals process messages, they evaluate the sources likability. One implication of this conceptualization is that the accessibility of the likability of the source can vary in memory. An earlier set of experiments by Roskos-Ewoldsen and Fazio (1992) found support for the hypothesis that the more accessible a sources likability is from memory, the greater the agreement with a message attributed to that source. The purpose of the current experiment is to extend RoskosEwoldsen and Fazios (1992a) ndings by identifying under what conditions the accessibility of a sources likability inuences message scrutiny. Once a sources likability is activated from memory, Roskos-Ewoldsen and Fazio (1992) identied three mechanisms by which it might affect persuasion. First, if the message is processed centrally or systematically (Chaiken,
Address correspondence and reprint requests to David R. RoskosEwoldsen, College of Communication, Box 870172, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0172. Fax: (205) 348-8080. E-mail: DROSKOS@CCOM.UA.EDU. 137

Liberman, & Eagly, 1989; Petty & Cacioppo, 1986), a likable source may result in biased processing of the message content (ELM postulate 5, Petty & Cacioppo, 1986; HSMs bias hypothesis, Chaiken et al., 1989). Earlier research has demonstrated that the message recipients attitude toward the topic of a message biases judgments concerning the messages content (Lord, Ross, & Lepper, 1979). Likewise, if an individual is centrally processing a message, considers the source of the argument, and likes that source, that individual may perceive the argument as better or stronger and, hence, more persuasive. Clearly, increasing the accessibility of the sources likability would increase the likelihood that the source is considered when processing the message arguments, which may result in biased processing. Several studies have found that individuals with highly accessible attitudes toward an issue display greater biased processing of information relevant to that topic than do individuals with relatively less accessible attitudes (Fazio, Roskos-Ewoldsen, & Powell, 1994; Fazio & Williams, 1986; Houston & Fazio, 1989; Schuette & Fazio, 1995). Second, if the message is processed peripherally, an
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increase in the accessibility of the sources likability may increase the probability that the sources likability will be activated from memory when the source is mentioned. Such activation should increase the likelihood that the message is processed using a likability heuristic (Chaiken et al., 1989; Eagly & Chaiken, 1993). Indeed, HSM hypothesizes that the accessibility of a heuristic from memory determines the likelihood that the heuristic will be used when making judgments about the message. Heuristics that are more accessible from memory should be more likely to be used in judging whether to agree with the messages content. Finally, increasing the accessibility of the sources likability may increase the likelihood that the message will be centrally processed (Petty & Cacioppo, 1986). Several studies have demonstrated that when research participants motivation to process a message is moderate, positive source factors can lead to greater central processing of the persuasive arguments (DeBono & Harnish, 1988; Heesacker, Petty, & Cacioppo, 1983; Priester & Petty, 1995). Recent research has also found that people with more accessible attitudes toward a topic of a message are more likely to systematically process the content of the message (Fabrigar, Priester, Petty, & Wegener, 1998). The nding that people with more accessible attitudes toward the topic of a message are more likely to process the content of a persuasive message critically makes sense, considering that when an individual is presented with a message concerning an attitude-evoking topic, the activation of that attitude will result in an affective reaction to the message. This affective reaction should act as a marker that this is an important topic (Krosnick, 1989; Roese & Olson, 1994), which should motivate the person to process the message centrally. Of course, accessible attitudes toward any number of features associated with a message may increase the likelihood that the message will be centrally processed because an affective reaction to any signicant feature of a message should signal that this is an important topic (Roskos-Ewoldsen, 1997). The research by Roskos-Ewoldsen and Fazio (1992) was not designed to differentiate which of the three mechanisms was operating in their experiments. Instead, the study involved a proattitudinal message with fairly strong arguments which should be conducive to all three mechanisms. This was done in order to provide evidence that the accessibility of source likability could inuence persuasion. All three mechanisms probably operate under different circumstances. However, given the recent ndings by Fabrigar et al. (1998) on the inuence of accessible attitudes on message scrutiny, we were interesting in testing whether the accessibility of source likability could also motivate increased message scrutiny under certain conditions. We reasoned that the accessibility of source likability is most likely to inuence message scrutiny when motivation to process the message is low (but ability is high), the message is

counterattitudinal, and the arguments contained in the message are relatively weak. In this situation, the message would be processed peripherally because motivation is low, except that the activation of the attitude toward the source could operate as a marker that this is an important message which should act as a cue to scrutinize the message content. In addition, when the message is counterattitudinal and contains weak arguments, it is unlikely that the activation of source likability would lead to a positive bias when processing the message. To test this possibility, two manipulations were implemented. First, it was necessary to manipulate the type of processing: central or peripheral. This was accomplished by manipulating the level of research participants topic-relevant involvement by presenting a message on building a toxic waste dump either in the city in which they lived (high involvement condition) or in a distant city (low involvement condition). Second, the accessibility of the sources likability was manipulated via repeated attitude expression. Research participants made one or ve evaluative judgments of the source. Previous research has demonstrated that making repeated attitude judgments of an object increases the accessibility of the attitude from memory (Fazio, 1995). The design of the experiment was a 2 (level of personal involvement) 2 (accessibility of the sources likability). The message contained ve weak arguments. The use of weak arguments allows participants the opportunity to produce more counterarguments to the counterattitudinal message in conditions of relatively objective message processing. After reading the message, participants were asked to express their attitudes, and list the cognitive responses they had while listening to the message. The predictions for cognitive responses and message agreement will be outlined for the motivated central processing mechanism and the increased likelihood of using a peripheral cue mechanism. No predictions were made for the biased processing explanation because it is unlikely that a likeable source would lead to biased processing of a counterattitudinal message. If increasing the accessibility of source likability motivates central processing, there should be an three-way interaction for participants cognitive responses between involvement, source accessibility and valence of the cognitive responses. This explanation predicts greater message scrutiny (e.g., more negative cognitive responses) in the high involvement and high accessibility conditions because the message contains weak arguments. Message scrutiny should be lower in the in the low involvement/low accessibility condition because the message recipient should be peripherally processing the message. The increased central processing explanation predicts that in the high source accessibility and high involvement conditions, the greater scrutiny of the weak arguments will reduce persuasion. Interestingly, we are predicting that in the high source accessibility condition, attributing the message to a

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liked source will actually reduce persuasion. The most persuasion should occur in the low involvement/low source accessibility condition because participants are peripherally processing the message and the message is from a likable source. If the accessibility of the sources likability increases the likelihood that the likability heuristic will be used, there should be a main effect of involvement for cognitive responses with more cognitive responses generated in the high involvement conditions because participants are centrally processing the message in these conditions. The accessible heuristic cue explanation predicts that the highest level of persuasion should occur in the low involvement/high source accessibility condition. In the high involvement conditions, participants will counterargue the weak arguments, and the likability of the source should not matter. In the low involvement conditions, there should be attitude change in both the high and low accessibility conditions because the source is likable. However, there should be more attitude change in the high accessibility condition because the likability heuristic would be more accessible from memory and more likely to be used. Critically, the two explanations differ in their predictions for the direction of persuasion in the low involvement/high source accessibility condition. The accessible heuristic cue explanation predicts that persuasion will be enhanced in this condition relative to the low involvement/low source accessibility condition because participants will rely on the likability heuristic. However, the motivated central processing explanation predicts the greater accessibility of the sources likability will motivate scrutiny of the weak arguments and, hence, reduce persuasion relative to the low involvement/ low source accessibility condition. Thus, the data from these two cells should prove particularly informative regrading the underlying mechanism that is operating in this situation.
METHOD

message advocated building a toxic waste dump in a distant city (Tulsa, OK). Procedure and Stimulus Materials Participants were told that they would be involved in pretests for two experiments that would be conducted later that semester. To bolster the cover story, subjects were asked not to participate in either of the experiments (entitled interpersonal perception and editorial messages) because they were participating in the pretests for these experiments. In addition, participants signed informed consent forms for each pretest. Accessibility was manipulated by repeated attitudinal expression in the context of the initial person perception pretest. Based on pilot data, Neil Armstrong was used as the source in this study. Specically, research participants from the same subject pool uniformly rated Neil Armstrong positively. However, their liking for Neil Armstrong was not very accessible from memory. Because of this, we could experimentally manipulate the accessibility of subjects liking for Neil Armstrong. Participants were instructed that this task involved the rating of famous individuals along a number of different dimensions. In the test booklet, there was a randomly ordered list of famous people (e.g., David Letterman). Participants were asked to evaluate each person using the 7-point bipolar scale that appeared below each name (e.g., funny/ boring). Participants were informed that they would be making multiple judgments of some of the people. Subjects rated total of 15 different people. Of these, 5 were rated once, 5 were rated three times, and 5 were rated ve times. Participants in the high accessible source likability condition rated Neil Armstrong along ve evaluative dimensions: positive/negative, favorable/unfavorable, pro/con, appealing/unappealing, and likable/unlikable. The rst four ratings were randomly dispersed among the ller items; however, the likable/unlikable rating was the last judgment of Armstrong. Subjects in the low source accessibility condition simply rated Armstrong along the likable/unlikable dimension, which was located at the same point in the questionnaire as for the subjects in the high accessibility condition. The subjects in the low accessibility condition made four judgments of Jane Fonda to replace the missing judgments of Armstrong. After completing this task, participants were given a second informed consent form for an experiment entitled editorial pretest. Identication of the message was accomplished by using a comment printed above the message clearly identifying the message as being written by Neil Armstrong and with a byline at the end of the message. After reading the message, subjects completed the dependent measures, described below, and were debriefed and dismissed. The message was constructed on the basis of two pilot

Research Participants Seventy-one students participated in this experiment. All participants received partial credit toward the fulllment of a class requirement. Research participants were randomly assigned to one of four conditions in the experiment. Design The design was a 2 (topic involvement: high vs low) 2 (accessibility of source likability: high vs low) full factorial design. Both factors were between subjects. Accessibility of source likability was manipulated by repeated attitudinal expression (i.e., 1 vs 5 times). In the high involvement condition, participants read a message advocating the building of a toxic waste dump in the city in which they live (Tuscaloosa, AL). In the low involvement condition, the

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studies. In the rst pilot study, 49 research participants from the same participant pool were given a list of 36 topics and asked to rate how personally relevant each topic was to their lives using a 0 (not at all relevant) to 10 (extremely relevant). Participants rated the building of a toxic waste dump where they lived (Tuscaloosa, AL, M 9.14) as more personally relevant than the building of a toxic waste dump in a distant city (Tulsa, OK, M 3.02), t(48) 13.08, p .001. In a second pilot study, 13 participants from the same participant pool were presented 5 protoxic waste dump arguments one at a time and asked to list their reactions to each argument. After completing this task, participants were instructed to indicate whether their reactions to each argument were positive (agreed with the message) or negative (critical of the message). All ve arguments were weak [the average percentage of negative responses across the ve arguments was 66%, t(12) 1.78, p .05, one-tailed]. These ve arguments were used to construct the message. Participants were led to believe that they would complete a questionnaire containing a number of questions about the message. They were told that it was necessary to know their attitude toward the topic of the message to interpret their answers about the message adequately. Attitudes toward the building of a toxic waste dump were measured using four semantic differential scales ranging from 1 to 7, with higher numbers corresponding to more positive attitudes (bad/ good, harmful/benecial, foolish/wise, and unfavorable/favorable). Then, participants rated Neil Armstrongs likability [using a 1 (extremely dislike) to 7 (extremely like) scale], intelligence [using a 1 (not at all intelligent) to 7 (extremely intelligent) scale], and familiarity [on a 1 (not at all familiarIve never heard of him) to 7 (very familiar, I know quite a lot about him) scale]. Finally, participants were given 2 min to list the thoughts that occurred to them as they read the message. After completing the cognitive response measure, participants were debriefed.
RESULTS

TABLE 1 Means for the Two-Way Interaction between the Type of Cognitive Responses and the Valence of Cognitive Responses
Valence of cognitive response Positive Negative Type of cognitive response Message .52 a (1.01) 1.38 b (1.56) Source .19 a (.43) .41 a (.73)

Note. The standard deviation is in parentheses. Means with different subscripts are signicantly signicant different at p .05 using Tukeys HSD.

Cognitive Responses After completing the attitude and source scales, participants were asked to list the thoughts they had while reading the message. These cognitive responses were coded along two dimensions: type of cognitive response and valence of cognitive response. Type of cognitive response dealt with whether the responses reected the content of the message or the source of the message. Valence of cognitive response consisted of whether the response was favorable or unfavorable to the message content or the source of the message. The cognitive responses were coded by a research assistant who was not involved with the research and was blind to the experimental hypothesis. One of the experimenters coded the cognitive responses for 16 participants to check inter-

coder reliability. There was 96% agreement on the categorization of cognitive responses. The cognitive response data were analyzed using a 2 (accessibility of source likability: high vs low) 2 (involvement: high vs low) 2 (cognitive response type: message or source) 2 (cognitive response valence: positive or negative) mixed ANOVA. Cognitive response type and valence were within-subjects variables. The analysis revealed a signicant main effect of cognitive response type [F(1, 65) 26.40, p .001, w 2 .23]. Specically, more of the cognitive responses were directed toward the message (M 1.90, SD 1.62) than toward the source of the message (M .59, SD .86). There was also a main effect of cognitive response valence [F(1, 65) 15.81, p .001, w 2 .16]. Substantially more of the cognitive responses were negative or critical of the message (M 1.78, SD 1.54) than were positive or supportive of the message (M .71, SD 1.18). Consistent with the pilot data, this result indicates that the arguments used in the message were weak. In addition, this nding is not surprising because the message was counterattitudinal. However, these main effects are subsumed within a two-way interaction between type of cognitive response and the valence of the cognitive responses [F(1, 65) 5.64, p .05, w 2 .06] (see Table 1). More cognitive responses were negative toward the message compared to the number of cognitive responses that were positive toward the message, negative toward the source, and positive to the source. In addition, there was a two-way interaction between accessibility of source likability and message involvement [F(1, 65) 5.53, p .05, w 2 .06] and a three-way interaction between accessibility of source likability, message involvement, and valence of the cognitive responses, [F(1, 65) 3.97, p .05, w 2 .03] (see Table 2). The accessibility and involvement manipulations had no effect on positive cognitive responses. However, participants generated fewer negative cognitive responses in the low involvement/low source accessibility condition than in the other conditions, which is consistent with the explanation

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TABLE 2 Means for the Three-Way Interaction between Involvement, Source Accessibility, and the Valence of Cognitive Responses
Valence of cognitive responses Positive Accessibility of sources likability Low .94 abc (1.56) .61 a (1.09) High .71 ab (1.05) .59 a (1.00) Negative Accessibility of sources likability Low .94 abc (1.20) 2.44 d (1.85) High 2.06 cd (1.30) 1.65 cd (1.41)

low involvement/low accessibility condition, participants attitudes were more positive because the message was attributed to a likable source. Judgments of the Source Presumably, the results of this experiment are due to increases in the accessibility of participants positive attitude toward Neil Armstrong. However, it is possible that repeated attitudinal judgments may have resulted in more extreme liking for Armstrong (Downing, Judd, & Brauer, 1992; cf. Fazio, 1995). To examine the possibility that participants attitudes toward Armstrong became more positive as a function of repeated attitudinal judgments of Armstrong, participants ratings of how much they liked Armstrong were analyzed. Specically, the ratings of Armstrongs likability from the person perception task (i.e., the nal rating of Armstrong in the high accessible conditions and the only rating of Armstrong in the low accessible conditions) were examined. The likability scores were analyzed using a 2 (accessibility of source likability: high vs low) 2 (involvement: high vs low) between-subjects ANOVA. Neither the main effect of source accessibility nor the main effect of involvement were signicant [F(1, 67) .35, p .55 and F(1, 67) 1.08, p .30, respectively]. Likewise, the interaction between source accessibility and involvement was not signicant [F(1, 67) .02, p .85. Consistent with a number of earlier studies, repeated attitude judgments had no effect on the extremity of participants attitudes (Fazio, 1995). Recall that during the nal questionnaire, participants were asked anew to make judgments of how well they liked Armstrong. In addition, participants rated how knowledgeable Armstrong was and how familiar they were with Neil Armstrong. All three of these ratings were analyzed using a 2 (source accessibility) 2 (involvement) ANOVA. For the likability rating, there was a main effect of involvement

Message involvement Low High

Note. The standard deviation is in parentheses. Means with different subscripts are signicantly signicant different at p .05 using Tukeys HSD.

that in the high source accessibility conditions, participants were centrally processing the message whether involvement was high or low. Attitude Scores Participants attitudes toward toxic waste dumps were measured using four semantic differential scales (good/bad, benecial/harmful, wise/foolish, favorable/unfavorable). These four scores were averaged to form a composite measure of participants attitudes, Cronbachs .94. Scores could range from 1 to 7, with higher scores indicating more positive attitudes toward toxic waste dumps. The composite attitude scores were analyzed using a 2 (accessibility of source likability: high vs low) 2 (involvement: high vs low) between-subjects ANOVA. There was a signicant main effect of involvement [F(1, 67) 8.16, p .01, w 2 .09]. In general, participants had more positive attitudes toward toxic waste dumps in the low involvement condition (M 4.08, SD 1.58) than in the high involvement condition (M 2.99, SD 1.67). In addition, there was a marginally signicant interaction between involvement and the accessibility of source likability, [F(1, 67) 3.50, p .06, w 2 .03]. Participants had the highest levels of message agreement in the low involvement/low accessibility condition (see Table 3). Furthermore, post hoc Tukey HSD found that participants attitudes in the other three conditions were not signicantly different from one another. This pattern of data is consistent with the explanation of Roskos-Ewoldsen and Fazios (1992) which focuses on the accessibility of the sources likability increasing participants likelihood of centrally processing the message. Apparently, participants were centrally processing the messages in the high involvement and high accessibility conditions and were able to counterargue the weak arguments in the message. However, in the

TABLE 3 Means for the Two-Way Interaction between Involvement and Source Accessibility for Participants Attitude toward Toxic Waste Dumps
Accessibility of sources likability Low 4.68 a (1.58) 2.90 b (1.78) High 3.44 b (1.37) 3.07 b (1.59)

Message involvement Low High

Note. Higher scores reect greater message agreement (probuilding the waste dump). The standard deviation is in parentheses. Means with different subscripts are signicantly signicant different at p .05 using Tukeys HSD.

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[F(1, 67) 8.05, p .01, w 2 .09]. Research participants in the high involvement condition had signicant lower liking for Armstrong (M 4.75, SD 1.29) than did participants in the low involvement condition (M 5.57, SD 1.09). Both the main effect of source accessibility and the interaction between source accessibility and involvement were nonsignicant, both Fs 1. Likewise, there was a main effect of involvement on participants judgments of how knowledgeable Neil Armstrong was, [F(1, 67) 5.48, p .05, w 2 .07]. Again, participants rated Armstrong as more knowledgeable in the low involvement condition (M 5.74, SD .95) than in the high involvement condition (M 5.11, SD 1.26). Both the main effect of source accessibility and the interaction between source accessibility and involvement were nonsignicant, both Fs 1. Considering that the research participants had just read a message where Armstrong advocated building a toxic waste dump in the city in which they live, it is not surprising that they liked Armstrong less and rated him as less knowledgeable than did the participants who read a message where Armstrong advocated a toxic waste dump in a distant city. Finally, as expected, there were no main effects for involvement (F 1) or source accessibility (F 1) on participants judgments of how familiar they were with Armstrong. The interaction was not signicant, [F(1, 67) 1.20, p .25].
DISCUSSION

Earlier research found that as the accessibility of a sources likability increased from memory, a message from that source resulted in greater message agreement (RoskosEwoldsen & Fazio, 1992). Three mechanisms were proposed for this effect. First, increasing the accessibility of the sources likability may increase the likelihood that the message is centrally processed because the activation of the attitude toward the source serves as a cue that this is a likable person which should increase the motivation to process the message (Roskos-Ewoldsen, 1997). This experiment sought to demonstrate that this is a viable mechanism for explaining the inuence of the accessibility of source likability on persuasion under certain circumstances. The results of this experiment indicate that when the message was counterattitudinal, the arguments were weak, and motivation to process the message was low because the topic was not personally relevant, participants did counterargue the messages content when the likability of the source was more accessible from memory. Taken together, the results of this experiment suggest that under certain circumstances, accessible liking for a source of a message can serve as a cue to centrally process a message. A second mechanism that may account for persuasive effects of accessible source likability is that an increase in

the accessibility of the sources likability may increase the probability that a likability heuristic will be activated from memory when the source is mentioned, and people are more likely to agree with the message because they like the source (Eagly & Chaiken, 1993). We would argue that this mechanism is most likely to occur when the ability to process the message is low. As the present experiment demonstrates, when peripheral processing is the default because of low motivation, the activation of the sources likability increased message scrutiny. However, when people are unable to process the message because of distraction or low topic relevant knowledge, the accessibility of the sources likability should increase the likelihood that the source would be used as a peripheral cue. In addition, while the research on the accessibility of source likability has focused on liked sources, when a disliked source delivers a message and the dislike is accessible from memory, the activation of the negative attitude toward the source may serve as a peripheral cue to disagree with, and possibly avoid, the message. Finally, the accessibility of the sources liking may have led to biased systematic processing of the messages content. If an individual is centrally processing a message, considers the source of the message, and likes the source, that individual may perceive the messages arguments as stronger and, hence, more persuasive. We would argue that this mechanism is most likely to occur when the message is being centrally processed, is proattitudinal, and the messagess arguments are at least moderately strong. The ndings of this experiment are consistent with several studies that have found that as the accessibility of peoples attitudes toward the topic of the message increases, the likelihood that the message is critically processed increases (Fabrigar et al., 1998). The nding that people with more accessible attitudes toward the topic of a message are more likely to process the content of a persuasive message critically makes sense because the activation of that attitude will result in an affective reaction to the message which should act as a marker that this is an important topic (Krosnick, 1989; Roese & Olson, 1994). The judgment that this is an important message should motivate the person to process the message centrally. However, this experiment indicates that the attitude toward the topic of the message is not the only attitude that can inuence how the message is processed. Indeed, peoples attitude toward the source of the message, and perhaps toward other features of the message, can motivate people to process a message centrally. Two explanations have been proposed for why accessible attitudes toward the topic of a message might lead to central processing of that message (Fabrigar et al., 1998). First, as just argued, the activated attitude can serve as a cue that this is an important topic (Krosnick, 1989; Roese & Olson, 1994; Roskos-Ewoldsen, 1997). Second, increasing the accessibility of participants attitude toward the topic of a

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message could increased the accessibility of their knowledge toward the topic which would enabled participants to critically process the message (Fabrigar et al., 1998). However, it is unlikely that increasing the accessibility of the sources likability increased the accessibility of topic-relevant knowledge in the present research, especially when Neil Armstrong and toxic waste are so remotely connected. Instead, the results of this experiment suggest that the most parsimonious explanation is that increasing the accessibility of the attitude toward the topic of a message, or important message features such as the messages source, increases central processing of the message because the activated attitude serves as a cue that this is an important message. Traditionally, theorizing on the effect of attitudes on the processing of persuasive messages has focused on how attitudes inuence perceptions of messages (e.g., Lord et al., 1979; Sherif & Sherif, 1967). Within this line of theorizing, attitudes are hypothesized to serve as a lens that biases how the message is perceived. However, the current research suggests that attitudes can also inuence the processing of persuasive messages by operating as information that this is an important message. In this experiment, the attitude toward the source did not result in biased processing of the message. Rather, the accessible attitude toward the source of the message acted as a piece of information that this is an important message (see also Fabrigar et al., 1998; Roese & Olson, 1994; Roskos-Ewoldsen, 1997). This attitude-asinformation explanation is similar to recent research and theorizing on the effects of mood on judgment (Clore, 1992; Sinclair & Mark, 1992). REFERENCES
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