Janssen Eva, van Osch Liesbeth, Lechner Lilian, de Vries Hein
a Faculty of Health, Medicine, and Life Sciences, Department of Health Promotion, School for Public Health and Primary Care , Maastricht University , Maastricht , The Netherlands.
J Health Commun. 2015;20(3):321-7. doi: 10.1080/10810730.2014.965362. Epub 2015 Jan 8.
Evidence is accumulating for the importance of feelings of risk in explaining cancer preventive behaviors, but best practices for influencing these feelings are limited. This study investigated the direct and moderational influence of affectively laden phrases in cancer risk messages. Two experimental studies were conducted in relation to different cancer-related behaviors--sunbed use (n = 112) and red meat consumption (n = 447)--among student and nonstudent samples. Participants were randomly assigned to one of two conditions: (a) a cognitive message using cognitively laden phrases or (b) an affective message using affectively laden phrases. The results revealed that affective phrases did not directly influence feelings of risk in both studies. Evidence for a moderational influence was found in Study 2, suggesting that affective information strengthened the relation between feelings of risk and intention (i.e., participants relied more on their feelings in the decision-making process after exposure to affective information). These findings suggest that solely using affective phrases in risk communication may not be sufficient to directly influence feelings of risk and other methods need to be explored in future research. Moreover, research is needed to replicate our preliminary indications for a moderational influence of affective phrases to advance theory and practice.
越来越多的证据表明，风险感受在解释癌症预防行为方面具有重要性，但影响这些感受的最佳做法却很有限。本研究调查了癌症风险信息中带有情感色彩的短语的直接和调节作用。针对学生和非学生样本，围绕不同的癌症相关行为——使用日光浴床（n = 112）和食用红肉（n = 447）——开展了两项实验研究。参与者被随机分配到两种情况之一：（a）使用带有认知色彩短语的认知信息，或（b）使用带有情感色彩短语的情感信息。结果显示，在两项研究中，情感短语均未直接影响风险感受。在研究2中发现了调节作用的证据，表明情感信息强化了风险感受与意图之间的关系（即，接触情感信息后，参与者在决策过程中更多地依赖自身感受）。这些发现表明，在风险沟通中单纯使用情感短语可能不足以直接影响风险感受，未来研究需要探索其他方法。此外，需要开展研究来重复我们关于情感短语调节作用的初步迹象，以推动理论和实践发展。
