When do gain-framed health messages work better than fear appeals? - PubMed (original) (raw)
Review
When do gain-framed health messages work better than fear appeals?
Brian Wansink et al. Nutr Rev. 2015 Jan.
Abstract
Past literature reviews of gain-framed versus loss-based health messages have been inconsistent and inconclusive. To resolve this and provide a clearer pattern, this review focuses on the individual or person-specific characteristics of target audiences. The results indicate that by answering the following four questions about a target audience, one can predict whether a gain-framed or a loss-based health message will be more effective. 1) Is there a low (versus high) level of involvement in the issue? 2) Is there a high (versus low) certainty of the outcome? 3) Is there a low (versus high) preference for risk? 4) Is there a heuristic (versus piecemeal) processing style? The profiling of audiences on these factors has two distinct benefits; it resolves many of the seeming inconsistencies in past positive-negative and gain-loss message research (such as fear appeals working better with experts than nonexperts) and it helps predict which type of message will be most effective with a given audience.
Keywords: audience-centered messaging; behavior; communication; gain-framed messages; health messaging; health policy; loss-framed messages; message framing; negative messages; positive messages.
© The Author(s) 2014. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the International Life Sciences Institute. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.
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