a University of Minnesota School of Public Health , Minneapolis , Minnesota , USA.
J Health Commun. 2014 Apr;19(4):493-510. doi: 10.1080/10810730.2013.821561. Epub 2014 Jan 13.
Advocates and policymakers strategically communicate about health disparities in an effort to raise public awareness, often by emphasizing the social and economic factors that influence these disparities. Previous research suggests that predisposing political orientation and values related to self-reliance and personal responsibility may produce resistance to such messages. In this study, the authors culled 4 messages about the causes of disparities in life expectancy from public discourse and randomly presented them to a nationally representative sample of 732 Americans. Three indicators of message resistance were measured: belief that messages are weak, elicitation of anger, and production of counterarguments. Expected political differences in message resistance were identified, with Republicans perceiving messages to be weaker, arousing less anger, and eliciting more counterarguing than for Democrats. Among 3 messages that described the social determinants of health disparities, a message that identified the role of personal choices (explicitly acknowledging personal responsibility) produced the least anger and counterarguing among Republicans. Political differences in anger arousal and counterarguing can be explained, in part, by predisposing values toward personal responsibility. These findings have relevance for policy advocates seeking to bridge public divides surrounding health disparities and for scholars advancing theories of reactance to policy-relevant health messaging.
倡导人士和政策制定者会有策略地就健康差异进行沟通，以提高公众意识，他们通常会强调影响这些差异的社会和经济因素。先前的研究表明，预先存在的政治倾向和与自力更生及个人责任相关的价值观可能会导致人们对这些信息产生抵触。在这项研究中，作者从公共话语中挑选了 4 条有关预期寿命差异原因的信息，并将其随机呈现给 732 名美国全国代表性样本。研究测量了三种信息抵触的指标：认为信息薄弱的信念、引发的愤怒情绪以及产生的反驳论点。研究确定了信息抵触的预期政治差异，与民主党人相比，共和党人认为信息更薄弱，引起的愤怒情绪更少，产生的反驳论点更多。在描述健康差异的社会决定因素的 3 条信息中，有一条信息明确指出了个人选择（明确承认个人责任）在健康差异中的作用，这在共和党人中引起的愤怒情绪和反驳论点最少。愤怒情绪和反驳论点的政治差异可以部分归因于个人责任的预先存在的价值观。这些发现对于寻求弥合围绕健康差异的公众分歧的政策倡导者以及推进与政策相关的健康信息抵触理论的学者具有相关性。
