Cognitive Editing and Childhood Vaccination

Jessica Hample

Jenna Dunlap

Paper presented to the annual meeting of the National Communication Association, Washington

DC, November 2013

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Abstract

Research into cognitive editing of persuasive arguments has revealed that individuals

pursue multiple goals in persuasive situations. Prior research has also revealed that an

individual’s cognitive editing choices are influenced by personality variables and vary

along with the persuasive situation. This study adds to prior research by systematically

investigating the effects of two personality variables (argumentativeness and verbal

aggressiveness), two situational variables (relational intimacy and perceived power) and

individuals’ prior attitudes about childhood vaccination on their cognitive editing

choices. The results show that the personality variables significantly correlated with

individuals’ use of the harm-to-other and harm-to-relationship criteria and had interaction

effects on other criteria. Relational intimacy was significantly and positively correlated

with respondents’ use of the harm-to-other and harm-to-relationship criteria while

perceived power did not significantly correlate with any cognitive editing standards.

However, both relational intimacy and perceived power showed interaction effects on

individuals’ use of editing criteria. Vaccine attitudes correlated positively with total

number of endorsements and negatively with use of the “this is false” editing criterion.

Vaccine attitudes also demonstrated interaction effects with other variables.

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Researchers have long been interested in why people make certain arguments while

rejecting others. When individuals are in communicative situations, they often have to decide

which of many possible message strategies to use and which would be the most persuasive.

Cognitive editing is the process that individuals privately use in order to select between those

strategies. Research on this topic has identified seven different types of criteria for rejecting

strategies, categorized into efficacy, principled grounds, person-centered objections, and

discourse competence concerns (Hample, 2000).

Much of the literature on this topic involves situations that do not elicit significant

emotional responses. For this study, the topic of childhood vaccination was chosen in order to

further our understanding of cognitive editing by investigating the process in a more highly

emotionally charged situation. Individuals’ attitudes surrounding this topic can vary widely

among a population and many individuals at either extreme experience strong emotional

investment in the topic. Another area that has been understudied in prior research has been the

effects of the situation on cognitive editing. This study attempts to add to our understanding of

the situation’s effects by systematically varying two situational variables—relational intimacy

and perceived power.

Cognitive Editing

For many years now, researchers have been looking at how and why individuals make

certain arguments and why they refuse to use certain other arguments (Hample & Dallinger,

1985). When in a persuasive situation, individuals are faced with many different choices of

message strategies to use. While there will be a few strategies chosen, many of these will be

discarded. Cognitive editing can be thought of as how individuals privately process these

persuasive message strategies. Hample and Dallinger investigated the phenomenon of cognitive

editing by developing a research instrument that presents participants with multiple possible

compliance gaining strategies drawn from Marwell and Schmitt‘s (1967) typology and asks

participants to indicate whether they would or would not use each strategy. If the participant

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indicated that they would not use the strategy, they were asked to indicate why they would not

use it. Using this methodology, Hample and Dallinger were able to determine that individuals

consider multiple goals to be relevant while crafting compliance gaining messages. According to

Hample and Dallinger (1992), “these grounds, or editing criteria, represent the person’s

interactional goals and standards” (p. 109).

Many individuals have multiple goals when going into communication situations. There

has been a lot of research that looks at the use of multiple goals in interpersonal situations. One

theory that ties into this topic is politeness. Brown and Levinson’s (1987) theory of politeness

explains that individuals consider two different types of face: positive face and negative face.

According to Holtgraves (2002) negative face is “the desire for autonomy” and positive face is

“the desire for connection with others” (p.39). According to Hample and Dallinger’s (1992)

article, work by Clark and Delia (1979) claims that individuals will have instrumental, relational,

and identity objectives while interacting with individuals. Maintaining these multiple goals is

very important when choosing rejection strategies, especially when dealing with a personal

relationship.

As one would suspect, there are several different criteria for rejecting an argument.

Hample and Dallinger came up seven such criteria. These choices are: that it won’t work, that it

is too negative to use, that it would damage one’s own self image, that it would harm the other

person, that it would injure the relationship between producer and target, that it would be false, or

that it would be irrelevant (Hample, 2000). From these seven different options, much of the

literature has divided them up into four classes of criteria: effectiveness, principled grounds,

person centered, and discourse competence (Hample & Dallinger, 1986; Hample & Dallinger,

1987; Hample & Dallinger, 1992).

Effectiveness can be broken down into two different categories. If an argument is

rejected due to effectiveness, it is perceived that the argument won’t work or that it could backfire

(Hample, 2000). While each study varies in the relative percentage of each type of rejection,

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Hample and Dallinger’s (1987) article found that effectiveness resulted in 5 to 10 percent of

rejections in their previous research. The next criterion is principled grounds. This is also stated

as principled objections in some of the research (Hample and Dallinger, 1986). In this case,

people rejected messages that are seen to be too negative to use, such as threats or bribes. In

Hample and Dallinger’s (1987) article they concluded that this type of rejection was used 20

percent of the time in their first study and 10 percent of the time in their second.

The third type of rejection is person-centered. This can be broken down into three

different criteria. The first is that the response could hurt the image of the person giving the

response. In this rejection, people are concerned about maintaining their positive face. The

second reason is that the response could damage the other person or hurt their feelings. The last

reason is that the response could hurt the relationship. Hample and Dallinger (1992) have found

that participants are unable to clearly distinguish between harm-to-other and the harm-to-

relationship criteria for rejection. As a result, Hample and Dallinger have not been able to identify

predictors for the harm-to-relationship criterion. They speculate that study participants use the

harm-to-other criterion in place of the harm-to-relationship criterion due to the former’s more

concrete nature (Hample & Dallinger, 1992).

The fourth and last type of rejection is discourse competence. Individuals who choose to

reject these messages do so because they see them as being false or irrelevant. Person-centered

and discourse competence have been the rejection types that are most often used in many of the

studies on cognitive editing (Hample & Dallinger, 1986; Hample & Dallinger 1987; Hample &

Dallinger, 1992). Due to past findings that person-centered and discourse competence criteria

are the most commonly used criteria for rejection of a message, the following hypothesis is

proposed:

HYPOTHESIS 1: Person-centered and discourse competence criteria will be the most

common reasons to reject a message.

Individual Difference Variables

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Argumentativeness

As one would suspect, individuals utilize different criteria for endorsing or rejecting

messages. Work by Hample (1986) suggests that individual differences such as

argumentativeness, verbal aggression, interpersonal orientation, and gender could have an impact

on the way individuals select certain arguments. Argumentativeness and verbal aggressiveness

have been investigated in relationship to cognitive editing using Infante and Rancer’s (1982) and

Infante and Wigley III (1986) scales.

Infante and Rancer (1982) conceptualized argumentativeness as “a generally stable trait

which predisposes the individual in communication situations to advocate positions on

controversial issues and to attack verbally the positions which other people take on these issues”

(p.72). Argumentativeness is best summed up by Hample and Dallinger’s (1986) article as

“willingness to argue” (p.4). According to Hample and Dallinger’s (1986) article, which

summarized research on argumentativeness, people high in argumentativeness “plan to give more

arguments in a given situation, seem more verbose, are considered to have more skill at arguing,

are perceived as relatively inflexible, but are less easily provoked, no more or less satisfied with

interpersonal relationships, and no more or less verbally aggressive” (p.5). As a result, Hample

and Dallinger (1986) tested and were able to support the hypotheses that individuals high in

argumentativeness would endorse more arguments and make more use of the person-centered

cognitive editing criteria. Therefore, the following hypotheses are proposed:

HYPOTHESIS 2a: High argumentative individuals will endorse more arguments than

low argumentative individuals.

HYPOTHESIS 2b: High argumentative individuals will use person centered criteria less

often than low argumentative individuals.

Verbal Aggression

Verbal aggression is different from argumentativeness in that the individual is attacking

another person’s self-concept. Verbally aggressive individuals typically display aggression in

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order to feel better about themselves (Infante & Wigley III, 1986). According to Hample and

Dallinger (1986) verbally aggressive individuals are less likely to use editing criteria related to

the welfare of others than their non-aggressive counterparts. Since these individuals seem to have

little concern-for-other, it would make sense that they would be less likely to use person-centered

messages than non-verbally aggressive individuals. Hample and Dallinger’s (1986) research

found that individuals who had little concern for others tended to use effectiveness as their

primary criterion for rejection. They also found that high verbally aggressive individuals

endorsed more arguments, used the effectiveness criterion more often, and used person-centered

criteria less often than low verbally aggressive individuals (Hample & Dallinger, 1986).

Therefore the following hypotheses are proposed:

HYPOTHESIS 3a: High verbally aggressive individuals will endorse more arguments

than low verbally aggressive individuals.

HYPOTHESIS 3b: High verbally aggressive individuals will reject messages due to

effectiveness criteria more often than low verbally aggressive individuals.

HYPOTHESIS 3c: High verbally aggressive individuals will reject messages due to

person-centered criterion less often than low verbally aggressive individuals.

Attitudes Toward Vaccination

Previous cognitive editing studies have focused on situation prompts that were unlikely to

elicit significant controversy, such as asking a friend to start jogging with you. However, many

compliance gaining situations deal with topics that reflect a wider range of attitudes in the general

population. One such topic is that of childhood vaccination. While distrust of vaccination began

with the first mandatory vaccination laws (Sharpe & Wolfe, 2002), such distrust has experienced

a resurgence in recent years. Controversies over the safety of childhood vaccination gained

renewed focus from the media following the 1998 study by Andrew Wakefield, et al.

Wakefield’s study suggested a possible connection between the combined measles, mumps, and

rubella (MMR) vaccine and the onset of autism. While the conclusions of that study have since

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been retracted by eleven of Wakefield’s twelve coauthors (Murch, et al., 2004) and by the

medical journal in which the study was published (The Editors of the Lancet, 2010), some parents

retain fears about the safety of the MMR and other vaccines.

Because previous research on cognitive editing has not investigated the effects of

controversial situations, there has not been an opportunity to examine the effects of individuals’

prior attitudes on their editing criteria. The childhood vaccination controversy provides a useful

opportunity to examine such effects due to the variation of vaccination-related beliefs and

attitudes in the population. It is likely that the strength of a person’s belief in the safety of

childhood vaccination will have a significant effect on their cognitive editing choices when asked

to endorse or reject vaccine-positive persuasive messages. Specifically, it is believed that

individuals who believe strongly in the safety of vaccination are likely to be more wary of the

negative consequences of not persuading the woman and will therefore be more willing to use

more persuasive strategies overall.

HYPOTHESIS 4a: Individuals who hold positive attitudes towards vaccination will

endorse more messages than individuals who hold negative attitudes towards vaccination.

Similarly, it is assumed that individuals who are more convinced of the safety of vaccines will

assign more importance to achieving the desired outcome and will therefore be more attuned to

the efficacy of possible arguments.

HYPOTHESIS 4b: Individuals who hold positive attitudes towards vaccination will

reject messages for effectiveness more often than individuals who hold negative attitudes

towards vaccination

It is also hypothesized that pro-vaccination individuals will be less invested in adhering to

principles regarding negative persuasive techniques and in appearing to be competent

communicators than individuals who are less convinced of the safety of vaccination and, thus, the

severity of the negative effects of not persuading the message target.

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HYPOTHESIS 4c: Individuals who hold positive attitudes towards vaccination will use

principled objection criteria less often than individuals who hold negative attitudes

towards vaccination.

HYPOTHESIS 4d: Individuals who hold positive attitudes towards vaccination will use

discourse competence criteria less often than individuals who hold negative attitudes

towards vaccination.

Finally, the scenario concerning vaccine safety is likely to present a wider range of attitudes in

the population than previous cognitive editing scenarios have demonstrated. Therefore, the

following research question is proposed:

Research Question 1: Will vaccine attitudes interact with any other individual or

situational variable to effect individuals’ use of cognitive editing criteria?

Situational Variables

The situation is something that seems to be of particular importance and seems to have an

impact on the criteria for rejection that individuals deem relevant. Many cognitive editing studies

have identified differences between the various situation prompts (e.g., Hample & Dallinger,

1985; Hample & Dallinger, 1986; Hample & Dallinger, 1987; Hample & Dallinger, 1992).

Despite these findings, no one has attempted to systematically vary situationally relevant criteria

in a cognitive editing study. This study attempts to systematically vary the relational intimacy

between the participant and the target of persuasion as well as the perceived power that the target

of persuasion has over her child.

It is assumed that participants who feel that they have a close friendship with the target of

persuasion are likely to be more interested in her face concerns. Therefore, they are more likely

than individuals who do not feel close to the target to reject messages that they feel will threaten

her face.

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HYPOTHESIS 5a: Participants who perceive a close relationship with the target of

persuasion are more likely than participants who perceive little relationship to the target

to reject messages based on person-centered criteria.

It is also hypothesized that participants who feel closer to the target will assign more importance

to the principled objections criterion; namely, that they not use threats, bribes, or other persuasive

techniques that are “too negative.”

HYPOTHESIS 5b: Participants who perceive a close relationship with the target of

persuasion are more likely than participants who perceive little relationship to the target

to reject messages based on principled objections.

It also seems likely that individual’s communication goals in persuasive contexts will be affected

by their perception of the importance of the desired outcome. If, for instance, a person thinks that

taking an exercise class with a friend will significantly improve the quality of life for both

individuals, that person is likely to be more invested in the persuasive goal and likely to use more

persuasive strategies than a person who merely thinks that the class would be a fun way to spend

an afternoon. Similarly, it is assumed that individuals who believe that a woman questioning

vaccination has the sole power to make healthcare decisions for her son are likely to be more

invested in persuading her to change her mind than will be individuals who believe that the

woman has little power to make her son’s healthcare decisions. It is therefore hypothesized that

individuals who perceive that the woman has high power will be likely to use more persuasive

strategies than those who perceive that she has little power.

HYPOTHESIS 6a: Participants who perceive that the target has significant power over

the child will be more likely than participants who perceive that the target has little power

over the child to endorse messages.

It is also believed that individuals who perceive high power will be more invested in persuading

the woman to change her mind than individuals who do not believe that she has much power.

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HYPOTHESIS 6b: Participants who perceive that the target has significant power over

the child will be more likely than participants who perceive that the target has little power

over the child will be more likely to reject messages based on the effectiveness criterion.

Finally, it is believed that individuals who believe that the woman has more power and therefore

that the consequences of her decisions are graver will be less interested in preserving their own

face or in adhering to principles proscribing excessive negativity.

HYPOTHESIS 6c: Participants who perceive that the target has significant power over

the child will be less likely than participants who perceive that the target has little power

over the child to reject messages based on the principled objections criterion.

Finally, given the importance of situation as identified in previous research, the final two research

questions are proposed concerning the effects of the manipulated situational variables:

Research Question 2: Will participants’ perceptions of relational intimacy with the target

of the persuasive messages interact with any other individual or situational variables to

effect individuals’ use of cognitive editing criteria?

Research Question 3: Will participants’ perceptions of the target’s power over the child

interact with any other individual or situational variables to effect individuals’ use of

cognitive editing criteria?

Method

Sample

Participants consisted of 239 undergraduate students enrolled in a mid-level Midwestern

university. The average reported age of participants was 20.6 and ranged from 17 to 46. The

sample was 54% male and was primarily made up of college juniors (n = 112), followed by

seniors (n = 50), sophomores (n = 42), and freshmen (n = 32). Four students did not report their

year in school, three did not report their sex, and 85 did not report their age.

Procedure

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Two-hundred and thirty-nine undergraduates were recruited from basic communication

courses. Participants were offered extra credit by their instructors for participating in the study.

The study design was a 2 (relational intimacy: high and low) x 2 (perceived power: high and

low) design. Participants were randomly assigned to one experimental condition.

Participants were told that research was being conducted into “what a person would or

would not say to a woman who had decided not to vaccinate her child.” They were instructed to

read the prompt and the explanation of the cognitive editing response codes on the first page.

They were also instructed, both orally and in writing, to choose only the single best answer from

the cognitive editing responses. Finally, participants were provided with a debriefing statement

thanking them for their participation and explaining the nature of the experimental design. They

were also given contact information for the investigators.

Each participant read a prompt stating that they were speaking to a woman named Teresa

with a 3 month-old son named David. The participants were told that the woman had said “I’m

really not sure that vaccines are safe. I don’t think that I’ll let David get any vaccinations. Good

nutrition and natural immunity are all that David needs.” Participants were briefed that they

“disagree with Teresa and think that her decision not to vaccinate will put David in danger.”

Independent Variables

Each participant was placed into one of four experimental conditions. Conditions one

and two represented high relational intimacy. In the high intimacy conditions, the prompt

scenario included the following sentence in bold text at the beginning of the prompt: “You are

speaking to your BEST FRIEND Teresa.” In the low relational intimacy condition (conditions

three and four), the bolded first line of the prompt read “You are speaking to a WOMAN YOU

HAVE JUST MET named Teresa.” A manipulation check consisting of two survey items

revealed that the experimental condition was successful, with a significant difference between the

means for perceived relational intimacy showing a significant difference between the high

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intimacy condition (M = 4.11, SD = 1.90) and low intimacy condition (M = 3.3, SD = 2.01), t(233

)= -3.236, p < .001.

Participants in conditions one and three were placed in the high perceived power

condition. These participants read the following sentence, in bold, at the end of the prompt:

“You know that Teresa is a SINGLE MOTHER who has COMPLETE CONTROL over David’s

healthcare decisions.” In the low perceived power condition (conditions two and four), the final

text of the prompt read: “You know that Teresa is DIVORCED and that David lives with his

father. Teresa does not have much interaction with her son and ex-husband. You believe that

Teresa has LITTLE TO NO CONTROL over David’s healthcare decisions.” A manipulation

check consisting of two survey items revealed a successful manipulation, with the high power

condition showing a significantly higher average perceived power (M = 6.03, SD = 1.38) than the

low power condition (M = 3.48, SD = 1.88), t(235) = -11.909, p < .001.

Each participant was also asked to complete the argumentativeness scale developed by

Infante and Rancer (1982) and the verbal aggressiveness scale developed by Infante and Wigley

III (1986). Finally, each participant completed a short scale designed to assess their pre-existing

attitudes towards vaccination. The original six-item scale had a Cronbach’s alpha of .70, but the

deletion of one item raised the value to .78. The resulting measure for vaccine attitudes ranged

from 1.8 (vaccine-critical) to 7.0 (vaccine-positive) on a 7-item scale (M = 5.24, SD = 1.09; See

Figure 1).

Dependent Variables

The dependent variable methodology was taken from Hample and Dallinger’s research

into cognitive editing. Three variations of each of Marwell and Schmitt’s (1967) typology of 16

compliance-seeking strategies were written. Participants were asked to indicate for each of the 48

strategies either that they would use the strategy or the reason that best represents why they would

not use the strategy. The possible reasons for rejection included efficacy (“This would not

work”), principled objections (“This is too negative to use”), three person-centered reasons (“I

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must treat myself positively”, “I must treat the other positively”, and “I must treat our relationship

positively”), two discourse-competence reasons (“This is false” and “This is irrelevant”) and an

“Other” category.

Results

Hypotheses

As can be seen in Figure 1, the first hypothesis was not supported. In fact, the most

common reasons to reject a message were efficacy (M = 7.81, SD = 7.6) and principled objections

(M = 6.72, SD = 4.91).

In order to test Hypothesis 2a, a correlation between argumentativeness and total number

of endorsements was conducted. The results were not significant, r(234) = .071, p > .276. In

order to test Hypothesis 2b, a correlation between argumentativeness and total number of person-

centered criteria uses was conducted. The result was significant and negative, r(234) = -.136, p =

.037. Of the three person-centered criteria, argumentativeness was only significantly correlated

with the harm-to-other criterion, r(234) = -.184, p = .005. Thus, hypothesis 2b was supported.

A correlation between verbal aggressiveness and total endorsements was run to test

Hypothesis 3a. The correlation was not significant, r(235) = .09, p = .168. In order to test

Hypothesis 3b, a correlation was run between verbal aggressiveness and total use of the

effectiveness criteria. This correlation was also not significant, r(235) = .104, p = .112.

Hypotheses 3a and 3b were not supported. Hypothesis 3c was examined through a correlation

between verbal aggressiveness and total use of person-centered criteria. This correlation was

significant and negative, r(235) = -.175, p = .007. Of the three person-centered criteria, two were

significantly correlated with verbal aggressiveness. The harm-to-other criterion was significantly

and negatively correlated with verbal aggressiveness, r(235) = -.188, p = .004. The harm-to-

relationship criterion was also significantly and negatively correlated with verbal aggressiveness,

r(235) = -.203, p = .002. Thus, Hypothesis 3c was supported.

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The fourth set of hypotheses concerned vaccine attitudes. In order to test Hypothesis 4a,

vaccine attitude was correlated with total endorsements. The correlation was significant and

positive, r(236) = .278, p < .001. Hypothesis 4a was supported. In order to test Hypothesis 4b, a

correlation was run between vaccine attitude and total use of the effectiveness criterion for

rejection. The correlation was not significant, r(236) = .039, p = .549. Hypothesis 4c concerned

the relationship between vaccine attitudes and use of the principled objection criterion. The

correlation was not significant, r(236) = .004, p = .955. Hypotheses 4b and 4c were not

supported. Finally, Hypothesis 4d was tested by correlating vaccine attitudes and use of

discourse competence criteria. The overall correlation was significant and negative, r(236) = -

.217, p = .001. Of the two discourse-competence criteria, only the “this is false” criterion was

significant, r(236) = -.262, p < .001. Hypothesis 4d was supported.

Hypotheses 5a and 5b concerned the relational intimacy variable. In order to test

Hypothesis 5a, relational intimacy was correlated with overall use of the person-centered criteria

for rejection. The correlation was significant and positive, r(233) = .225, p = .001. Of the three

person-centered criteria, both harm-to-other, r(233) = .169, p = .009, and harm-to-relationship,

r(233) = .195, p = .003, were significantly and positively correlated with relational intimacy.

Relational intimacy and use of the principled objections criterion were correlated in order to test

Hypothesis 5b. The correlation was significant and positive, r(233) = .176, p = .007. Both

Hypotheses 5a and 5b were supported.

The final set of hypotheses concerned the effects of the perceived power of the woman

over her son’s healthcare decisions. Hypothesis 6a was tested by correlating perceived power and

total number of endorsed messages. The correlation was not significant, r(235) = -.026, p = .687.

Hypothesis 6b was tested by correlating perceived power and use of the effectiveness criterion.

This correlation was also not significant, r(235) = -.108, p = .096. Hypothesis 6c was tested with

a correlation between perceived power and use of the principled objections criterion. This

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correlation was not significant, r(235) = .000, p = .995. Thus, Hypotheses 6a, 6b, and 6c were

not supported.

Research Questions

The research questions concerned the possibility of interaction effects between individual

or situational variables. In order to answer the research questions, the measures for vaccine

attitude, relational intimacy, perceived power, argumentativeness, and verbal aggressiveness were

mean centered in order to reduce multicolinearity between the variables when constructing the

product term. Multiple regressions were then conducted on the mean centered variables.

Research Question 1

Research Question 1 concerned possible interactions between vaccine attitudes and any

other variables. The regressions showed a number of significant interaction effects between

vaccine attitude and other variables on the “this is false” criterion. There was a significant

interaction effect between vaccine attitude (VaxAtt) and relational intimacy (RelInt) on the use of

the “This is false” discourse-competence criterion, such that “this is false” = 6.02 -1.39 VaxAtt -

.33 RelInt + .46(VaxAtt x RelInt). The entire model is significant (R =.34, p < .001 ). The

model shows a non-significant main effect for relational intimacy (p = .072) and a significant

main effect for vaccine attitudes at p < .001, such that individuals who demonstrated more

negative than average vaccine attitudes were more likely to use the “false” criterion (M = 7.2, SD

= .53) than were individuals who demonstrated more positive than average vaccine attitudes (M =

4.9, SD = .56). The interaction effect was also significant (p = .005) such that individuals

displaying more-positive-than-average vaccine attitudes were unlikely to use the “false” criterion

when they perceived little relational intimacy (M = 4.7, SD = .85) and slightly more likely to use

the criterion when they perceive higher intimacy (M = 5.1, SD = .72), whereas individuals who

display less-positive-than-average vaccine attitudes were significantly more likely to use the

“false” criterion when they perceived little relational intimacy (M =8.3 , SD = .77) but much less

likely to use when they did perceive relational intimacy (M = 6.0, SD = .72) (see Figure 2).

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There was also a significant interaction effect between vaccine attitude and

argumentativeness (Argu) on the “False” criterion. The overall model, “False” = 6.02 – 1.32

VaxAtt + .53 Argu - .57 (VaxAtt x Argu), was significant (R = .32, p < .001). While the main

effect for argumentativeness was not significant (p = .069), the main effect for vaccine attitude (p

< .001) and the interaction effect (p = .016) were both significant. Individuals who demonstrated

more negative than average vaccine attitudes were more likely to use the “false” criterion (M =

7.1, SD = .54) than were individuals who demonstrated more positive than average vaccine

attitudes (M =4.9 , SD = .55). Individuals who demonstrate below average vaccine attitudes

showed more difference in use of the “false” criterion between below average argumentativeness

(M =6.9 , SD = .73) and above average argumentativeness (M = 7.3, SD = .79) than did

individuals reporting above average vaccine attitudes (Low Argu: M = 4.8, SD = .77; High Argu:

M = 5.1, SD = .77) (see Figure 3).

There was a significant interaction effect between vaccine attitude and verbal

aggressiveness (VerbAgg) on the “False” criterion. The overall model, “False” = 5.92 – 1.33

VaxAtt + .10 VerbAgg - .60 (VaxAtt x VerbAgg), was significant (R = .30, p < .001). The main

effect for verbal aggressiveness was not significant (p = .74) while the main effect for vaccine

attitude was (p < .001) such that individuals who demonstrated more negative than average

vaccine attitudes were more likely to use the “false” criterion (M = 7.0, SD = .54) than were

individuals who demonstrated more positive than average vaccine attitudes (M = 4.9, SD = .55).

The interaction effect was significant at p = .028, such that participants with below average

vaccine attitudes were less likely to use the “false” criterion when they also displayed lower-than-

average verbal aggressiveness (M =6.9 , SD = .80) than when the displayed higher-than-average

verbal aggressiveness (M = 7.1, SD = .72); whereas, participants with above average vaccine

attitudes were more likely to use the “false” criterion when they displayed lower-than-average

verbal aggressiveness (M = 5.1, SD = .76) than when they displayed higher-than-average verbal

aggressiveness (M = 4.8, SD = .78) (see Figure 4).

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Research Question 2

The second research question concerned interaction effects involving relational intimacy.

In addition to the interaction between relational intimacy and vaccine attitudes on respondents’

use of the “false” criterion, relational intimacy showed interaction effects on a number of other

cognitive editing criteria. First, there was a significant interaction effect between relational

intimacy and perceived power (PPower) on the use of the efficacy criterion. The overall model,

Efficacy = 7.74 – 051 RelInt - .40 PPower + .23 (RelInt x PPower), was significant (R = .20, p =

.022). The main effect for perceived power was not significant (p = .09) while the main effect for

relational intimacy was significant (p = .04) such that individuals who perceived lower-than-

average relational intimacy were more likely to use the efficacy criterion (M = 9.1, SD = .74) than

were individuals who perceived higher than average relational intimacy (M = 6.9, SD = .66). The

interaction effect was significant (p = .05) such that individuals perceiving below average

relational intimacy were much more likely to use the efficacy criterion if they perceived that their

message target had little power (M = 10.8, SD = 1.12) than if they perceived that the message

target had more power (M = 7.4, SD = .98). However, individuals who perceived above average

relational intimacy showed less difference in use of the efficacy criterion, using it only slightly

more with message targets perceived to have little power (M = 7.1, SD = .95) than with those

perceived to have high power (M = 6.7, SD = .90) (see Figure 5).

Relational intimacy and perceived power also showed a significant interaction effect on

the use of the harm-to-relationship criterion. The overall model, Harm-to-Relationship = 3.98 +

.32 RelInt + .09 PPower + .12 (RelInt x PPower), is significant (R = .25, p = .002). The main

effect for perceived power is again not significant (p = .40) while the main effect for relational

intimacy was significant (p = .008) such that individuals who perceived lower than average

relational intimacy were less likely to use the harm-to-relationship criterion (M = 3.4, SD = .36)

than were individuals who perceived higher-than-average relational intimacy (M = 4.4, SD = .32).

The interaction effect was significant (p = .03) such that individuals who perceive lower than

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average relational intimacy showed little difference in their use of the harm-to-relationship

criterion between message target’s high (M = 3.5, SD = .47) and low perceived power (M = 3.4,

SD = .54) conditions. However, individuals who perceived higher-than-average relational

intimacy with the message target were much more likely to use the harm-to-relationship criterion

when they perceived that the message target had high power (M = 5.0, SD = .44) than when they

perceived that she had low power (M = 3.8, SD = .46) (see Figure 6).

Finally, a significant interaction effect was also found between relational intimacy and

argumentativeness on the use of the principled objections criterion. The overall model,

Principled Objections = 6.8 + .47 RelInt + .09 Argu + .32 (RelInt x Argu), was significant (R =

.26, p = .001). The main effect for argumentativeness was not significant (p = .71), but the main

effect for relational intimacy was significant (p = .004) such that individuals who perceived

lower-than-average relational intimacy were less likely to use the principled objection criterion

(M = 5.6, SD = .48) than were individuals who perceived higher-than-average relational intimacy

(M =7.6, SD = .42). The interaction effect was also significant (p = .006) such that individuals

who perceived less than average relational intimacy were more likely to use principled objections

when they were less argumentative than average (M = 5.7, SD = .67) than when they were more

argumentative than average (M =5.5 , SD = .68). However, individuals who perceived higher-

than-average relational intimacy were less likely to use principled objections if they were less

argumentative (M =7.3 , SD = .58) than if they were more argumentative (M = 7.8, SD = .62) (see

Figure 7).

Research Question 3

The final research question concerned the possible interaction effects between perceived

power and other variables on cognitive editing. In addition to interactions with perceived

relational intimacy, there was a significant interaction effect between perceived power and

aggressiveness on two cognitive editing criteria. First, a significant interaction between

perceived power and verbal aggressiveness appeared with the efficacy criterion. The overall

19

model, Efficacy = 7.78 - .43 PPower + .75 VerbAgg - .44 (PPower x VerbAgg), was significant

(R = .21, p = .02). The main effects for perceived power (p = .07) and verbal aggressiveness (p =

.06) were not significant, but the interaction effect between perceived power and verbal

aggressiveness was significant (p = .028). Individuals who demonstrated less-than-average

verbal aggressiveness were not likely to use the efficacy criterion regardless of the amount of

power that the message target was perceived to have over her son (high: M = 6.5, SD = .92; low:

M = 6.7, SD = 1.1), while individuals who demonstrated above average verbal aggressiveness

were much more likely to reject messages due to efficacy if they perceived that the message

target had little power over her child (M = 10.1, SD = .96) than if they perceived her to have more

power over her son (M =7.6 , SD = .95) (see Figure 8).

Finally, perceived power and verbal aggressiveness had a significant interaction effect on

the use of the harm-to-self criterion. The overall model, Harm-to-Self = 1.20 - .05 PPower + .20

VerbAgg + .14 (PPower x VerbAgg), was significant (R = .21, p = .02). The main effects for

perceived power (p = .47) and verbal aggressiveness (p = .09) were not significant while the

interaction effect was significant (p = .02). Individuals who were less verbally aggressive than

average were more likely to use the harm-to-self criterion if they perceived that the message

target had little power over her son (M = 1.6, SD = .32) than if they perceived her to have more

power over her son (M = .4, SD = .26). On the other hand, individuals who demonstrated higher-

than-average verbal aggressiveness were less likely to use the harm-to-self criterion if they

perceived that the message source had little power over her son (M = 1.3, SD = .27) and more

likely to use the criterion if they perceived that she had more power over her son (M = 1.7, SD =

.27) (see Figure 9).

Discussion

The first hypotheses was drawn from Hample and Dallinger’s previous research into

cognitive editing and predicted that person-centered and discourse competence criteria would be

the most common reasons for rejecting a possible message. The fact that this hypothesis was not

20

supported (and that, in fact, person-centered and discourse competence criteria were the least

likely to be used) is of particular interest. In prior research, person-centered and discourse

competence criteria have been respondents’ most common reasons for rejecting a message,

indicating that the secondary goals of face threat management and appearing to be competent

communicators were more important to the respondents than the goals of achieving a desired

outcome or adhering to principles dictating the amount of negativity that is appropriate in

conversation. The discrepancy between previous research and the results of this study is most

likely due to the nature of the prompt scenario. In previous research, the prompt scenarios have

focused on a desired outcome (such as spending a vacation together) that is likely to be seen as

less important than that of making a safe healthcare decision for a young child. When presented

with a scenario in which the desired outcome is seen as important, achieving the desired outcome

(represented by use of the efficacy criterion) is likely to become more important to the

communicator.

The increased use of the principled grounds criterion is also likely due to the nature of the

prompt scenario. In previous research, the respondent was instructed to obtain some favor that

the message target would do for the respondent. However, in this scenario, the respondent is

asked to convince the message target to make a healthcare decision for the target’s child. It is

likely that participants did not feel that they had the same right to make this request as they would

have to make a request that only affected the message target and the respondent. This is

supported by the finding that the use of principled objection and perceived relational intimacy

(Hypothesis 4b) are positively correlated. That is, the closer the relationship with the message

target, the more important it was to the respondent not to say anything too negative. Perhaps

respondents who did not feel as close to the message target were less worried about interjecting

into the woman’s parenting decisions. Overall, the lack of support for Hypothesis 1 provides

evidence that people’s cognitive editing choices (and, thus, the goals that they consider important

in a conversation) vary greatly depending on the situation.

21

The second and third sets of hypotheses concerned the individual personality variables of

argumentativeness and verbal aggressiveness. Hypotheses 2a and 3a were not supported,

indicating that there is no significant correlation between the number of arguments endorsed and

either argumentativeness or verbal aggressiveness. The lack of support for Hypothesis 3b also

indicates that verbal aggressiveness is not significantly related to the use of the efficacy criterion.

The results of this study indicate that argumentativeness and verbal aggressiveness are primarily

correlated only with criteria concerning the other or the relationship, in that individuals high in

argumentativeness or verbal aggressiveness are less likely to use the harm-to-other criterion and

individuals high in verbal aggressiveness are also less likely to use the harm-to-relationship

criterion. This indicates that protecting the other person’s face is not a particularly important

secondary goal to individuals high in either area. It is interesting to note, however, that both

argumentativeness and verbal aggressiveness displayed significant interactions with other

variables on a number of cognitive editing criteria. Thus, argumentativeness and verbal

aggressiveness are not themselves predictive of the interaction goals that a person will consider

relevant in a given conversation, but they do influence the strength of the importance of other

variables.

The fourth set of hypotheses dealt with the predicted effects of vaccine attitudes on

individuals’ communication goals. As was alluded to earlier, this study presents a very different

scenario than prior cognitive research studies have. It is unlikely that there was significant

variation of relevant attitudes or beliefs in prior studies’ samples. One study asked respondents to

convince a friend to take up an exercise class with them. While the sample’s interest in actually

taking an exercise class may have varied, it is not likely that a significant proportion felt that they

were being asked to try to persuade a friend to do something unsafe. The use of the vaccination

scenario allows for a variety of possible attitudes towards the topic of conversation (see Figure 1).

Unlike argumentativeness and verbal aggressiveness, prior vaccine attitudes are

significantly correlated with the number of arguments endorsed (Hypothesis 4a). Specifically, the

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more certain a person was of the safety of vaccination, the more arguments they were willing to

use. Conversely, the more unsure a person was of the safety of vaccination, the more often they

would reject a message for being false (Hypothesis 4d). Hypotheses 4b and 4c, however, were

not supported by the data. It appears that there is no relationship between vaccine attitudes and

the importance of achieving a desired goal or adhering to principle. The results from the first

hypothesis indicate that efficacy and principle are important to respondents regardless of their

prior attitudes towards the subject.

The results of the multiple regressions used to investigate Research Question 1 indicate

that prior attitudes do interact with argumentativeness and verbal aggressiveness to affect the use

of the “false” criterion. The prior vaccine attitudes variable also interacts with perceived

relational intimacy to affect use of the “false” criterion. It appears that, in addition to the

predicted main effect, the effect of prior attitudes can be altered by certain personality and

situational variables.

The fifth and sixth set of hypotheses concerned the effects of the manipulated situational

variables on individuals’ use of cognitive editing standards. Relational intimacy was shown to be

important in determining the various conversational goals that are made salient in a given

situation. Individuals who perceived higher relational intimacy were more likely to use both the

harm-to-other and the harm-to-relationship criteria. This indicates that the closer a person feels to

the target of persuasion, the more important concern for the other’s face becomes to them. The

regressions used to investigate Research Question 2 also indicate that relational intimacy interacts

with a number of other factors to affect the salience of certain communication goals.

Finally, Hypotheses 6a, 6b, and 6c concerned the importance of the power that

respondents felt that the woman had over her son’s healthcare decisions. It was expected that this

perception would be a significant factor in deciding which communication goals were most

salient to the respondents. However, the hypotheses were not supported. In fact, perceived

power was not significantly correlated with any of the cognitive editing criteria. It is unlikely,

23

then, that perceived power has any direct relationship with the importance of any particular

communication goal. However, the results of Research Question 3 did indicate that perceived

power interacts with both relational intimacy and verbal aggressiveness to affect the importance

of efficacy, with relational intimacy to affect the importance of protecting the relationship, and

with verbal aggressiveness to affect the importance of protecting one’s own face.

Overall, the results of this study support the findings of previous research that indicate

that the specifics of the communicative situation are important in deciding which communication

goals are most or least important. The reversing of the order of cognitive editing criteria usage in

this study is particularly interesting because it indicates that the order of secondary goals in a

conversation can be completely changed rather than just the relative importance of those goals.

In other words, it could not be concluded from previous research whether or not person-centered

and discourse competence concerns were always the most important conversational goals and that

only the relative importance, but not the order of importance, could change. The results of this

study demonstrate that people’s communication goals vary widely from one situation to the next.

Limitations and Further Research

Future research into individuals’ communication surrounding vaccine resistance also

needs to be conducted. Continuing research should attempt to move beyond the easily available

college-student sample. While the results of this study indicate a variety of prior vaccine attitudes

among college students, many other characteristics of this study’s sample are fairly homogenous.

The mean age of this sample was 20.6 years. While the investigators neglected to ask participants

whether they themselves had young children, it is not likely that many of them did. A replication

of this study design among young parents may produce different results, given the increased

importance of childhood vaccination to such a sample. Furthermore, by virtue of collecting data

from undergraduate classes, the sample is limited only to those individuals who have some

university education but no specialized post-graduate knowledge of medicine. Samples that

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included individuals who did not attend college or that focus on medical professionals are also

likely to yield different results.

Given the apparent variability of conversational goals due to situational context, it is

important that future research continue to identify the various situational variables that affect such

goals. It would also be useful ask participants to recall an actual conversation and to report on

whether they would have used certain messages. This is likely to have more real-world validity

than asking them to imagine speaking to a hypothetical woman.

While previous research has investigated the impact of relatively stable personality traits

on communication goals, this study demonstrates the importance widening the range of prompt

scenarios in order to more fully understand the impact of prior knowledge and attitudes. In order

to further investigate the impact of prior attitudes, further scenarios should be used that are more

controversial and thus present a broader range of attitudes in a given population.

25

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Figure 1: Histogram of participants’ vaccine attitudes

Figure 2: Interaction between vaccine attitudes and relational intimacy on “False” criterion

27

Figure 3: Interaction between vaccine attitudes and argumentativeness on “False” criterion

Figure 4: Interaction between vaccine attitudes and verbal aggressiveness on “False” criterion

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Figure 5: Interaction between relational intimacy and perceived power on efficacy criterion

Figure 6: Interaction between relational intimacy and perceived power on harm-to-relationship

criterion

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Figure 7: Interaction between relational intimacy and argumentativeness on principled objections

criterion

Figure 8: Interaction between perceived power and verbal aggressiveness on efficacy criterion

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Figure 9: Interaction between perceived power and verbal aggressiveness on harm-to-self

criterion

Table 1: Participants’ use of cognitive editing criteria

Cognitive Editing Criteria Mean

Standard

Deviation Minimum Maximum

Efficacy 7.81 7.60 0 42

Principled Objections 6.72 4.91 0 27

Discourse-Competency

This is False 6.03 5.91 0 44

This is Irrelevant 5.90 4.98 0 25

Person-Centered Reasons

Harm-to-Relationship 3.97 3.66 0 20

Harm-to-Other 3.81 3.72 0 22

Harm-to-Self 1.19 2.18 0 12

Other Reason 1.71 3.76 0 33