Central and Peripheral Routes to Advertising Effectiveness: The Moderating Role of Involvement
Central route: people’s attitude change resulting from really considering the information.
1. The cognitive justification of attitude discrepant behavior.
2. The comprehension, learning and retention of issue or product relevant information.
3. The nature of a person’s idiosyncratic cognitive responses to external communications.
4. The manner in which a person combines and integrates issue or product relevant beliefs into an
overall evaluative reaction.
relatively enduring and predictive of behavior.
Peripheral route: attitude changes because the issue or object is associated with positive or negative cues.
Whether a simple attitudinal inference can be based on observing one’s own behavior.
Whether the advocacy falls within one’s latitude of acceptance or rejection.
Whether some transient situational utility is associated with adopting a particular attitude.
Whether an advocated position or product is classically conditioned to basic but issue-relevant cues
(food) or is associated with secondary cues (pictures).
relatively temporary and unpredictive behavior.
People use both routes.
Hypothese: under "high involvement," attitudes in response to an advertisement would be affected via the
central route, but under "low involvement," attitudes would be affected via the peripheral route.
1a. The quality of the arguments presented in the ad have a greater impact on product attitudes under
high rather than low involvement conditions.
1b. The celebrity status of the product endorsers have a greater impact on product attitudes under low
rather than high involvement conditions.
Involvement and attitude change
High involvement messages have greater personal relevance and consequences than low involvement
messages.
ELM: different methods of inducing persuasion may work best depending on whether the elaboration
likelihood of the communication situation (message- or issue-relevant) is high or low.
High central route
Low peripheral route
When an issue or product increases in personal relevance or consequences, it becomes more important
and adaptive to forming a reasoned opinion people are more motivated to devote the cognitive effort.
Different variables affect persuasion under high and low involvement conditions.
Different kinds of messages appeal for different audiences.
Method
In totaal deden er 160 mannelijke en vrouwelijke psychologie studenten mee aan het experiment. De
onafhankelijke variabelen zijn involvement (high en low), argument quality (strong en weak) en peripheral
cue (celebrity of noncelebrity). Voor afhankelijke variabelen is er gekeken naar de herinnering van een
merk, herkenning ervan en aankoop intenties van het product ‘Edge razors’.
Er is gekeken naar advertenties met verschillen tussen de bovengenoemde factoren. Daarna zijn er nog
een paar vragen gesteld aan de participanten. Iedere deelnemer legde het onderzoek afgezonderd af.
,Results
Involved subjects were more skeptical of the product than were less involved subjects.
Subjects liked the product significantly more when the ad contained cogent arguments than when
the arguments were specious and when a celebrity was used.
Strong arguments are significantly more persuasive.
The impact of argument quality on attitudes was significantly
greater under high rather than low involvement, the same for
purchase intentions.
Subjects said they would be more likely to buy the product when the
arguments presented were strong rather than weak.
More high involvement subjects recalled the product category than
low involvement subjects. Exposure to the famous endorser
increased recall of the product category under low involvement
condition, but that leads to reductions in brand recognition.
Increasing involvement with the product enhanced recall of the
product category and the brand name.
Under high involvement, however, the use of prominent personalities enhanced brand name recognition
The recall and recognition measures were uncorrelated with attitudes or intentions toward Edge razors.
, Increasing Compliance by Improving the Deal: The That’s-Not-All Technique (Burger)
Experiment 1
Test the effect of inducing an additional product into the sales package after giving the price but before
allowing the buyer to respond.
Customers were offered an additional package of cookies at no extra charge after thinking about buying a
cupcake, they didn’t have time to respond.
Prediction: these customers would be more likely to buy the items than would subjects who were told
about the entire package and price together. True
Method
The control group could buy cookies and cupcakes for a certain price. The other group bought cupcakes
and received ‘free’ cookies as extra.
Results
More subjects in the manipulated condition bought cupcakes than in the control condition.
Experiment 2
Reduce the price between the initial price citation and the customer’s response.
Prediction: customers presented with the lower price after being allowed to think about a higher price
would be more likely to buy the product than customers presented only the lower price. True
Method
Customer who asked the price were told a certain price and later it would be reduced. The control group
only heard the lower price.
Results
More subjects in the manipulated condition bought cupcakes than in the control condition.
Why does this work?
1. Reciprocity norm
2. Attitudinal (social) judgments
a. Agreeing or not needs to be considered within the particular frame of reference of the
individual making the judgment; anchor point.
Experiment 3
Prediction: if the seller’s action is seen as something s/her is forced to do, there is no need to reciprocate
and buy the product. But if the price reduction is perceived as a personal gesture, increased compliance
should follow.
Method
Negotiation condition; price reduction.
No-negotiation condition; certain price, other says to sell for lower price but they don’t do that.
Control condition
Results
Subjects in the negotiation condition were more likely to make a purchase than were
subjects in the control condition. A perception of negotiation on the part of the seller is at least partly
responsible for the effectiveness of the that's-not-all effect. Although the appearance of negotiation
increases the effectiveness of the technique, a norm of reciprocity alone may not account for the
effectiveness of the technique.
Central route: people’s attitude change resulting from really considering the information.
1. The cognitive justification of attitude discrepant behavior.
2. The comprehension, learning and retention of issue or product relevant information.
3. The nature of a person’s idiosyncratic cognitive responses to external communications.
4. The manner in which a person combines and integrates issue or product relevant beliefs into an
overall evaluative reaction.
relatively enduring and predictive of behavior.
Peripheral route: attitude changes because the issue or object is associated with positive or negative cues.
Whether a simple attitudinal inference can be based on observing one’s own behavior.
Whether the advocacy falls within one’s latitude of acceptance or rejection.
Whether some transient situational utility is associated with adopting a particular attitude.
Whether an advocated position or product is classically conditioned to basic but issue-relevant cues
(food) or is associated with secondary cues (pictures).
relatively temporary and unpredictive behavior.
People use both routes.
Hypothese: under "high involvement," attitudes in response to an advertisement would be affected via the
central route, but under "low involvement," attitudes would be affected via the peripheral route.
1a. The quality of the arguments presented in the ad have a greater impact on product attitudes under
high rather than low involvement conditions.
1b. The celebrity status of the product endorsers have a greater impact on product attitudes under low
rather than high involvement conditions.
Involvement and attitude change
High involvement messages have greater personal relevance and consequences than low involvement
messages.
ELM: different methods of inducing persuasion may work best depending on whether the elaboration
likelihood of the communication situation (message- or issue-relevant) is high or low.
High central route
Low peripheral route
When an issue or product increases in personal relevance or consequences, it becomes more important
and adaptive to forming a reasoned opinion people are more motivated to devote the cognitive effort.
Different variables affect persuasion under high and low involvement conditions.
Different kinds of messages appeal for different audiences.
Method
In totaal deden er 160 mannelijke en vrouwelijke psychologie studenten mee aan het experiment. De
onafhankelijke variabelen zijn involvement (high en low), argument quality (strong en weak) en peripheral
cue (celebrity of noncelebrity). Voor afhankelijke variabelen is er gekeken naar de herinnering van een
merk, herkenning ervan en aankoop intenties van het product ‘Edge razors’.
Er is gekeken naar advertenties met verschillen tussen de bovengenoemde factoren. Daarna zijn er nog
een paar vragen gesteld aan de participanten. Iedere deelnemer legde het onderzoek afgezonderd af.
,Results
Involved subjects were more skeptical of the product than were less involved subjects.
Subjects liked the product significantly more when the ad contained cogent arguments than when
the arguments were specious and when a celebrity was used.
Strong arguments are significantly more persuasive.
The impact of argument quality on attitudes was significantly
greater under high rather than low involvement, the same for
purchase intentions.
Subjects said they would be more likely to buy the product when the
arguments presented were strong rather than weak.
More high involvement subjects recalled the product category than
low involvement subjects. Exposure to the famous endorser
increased recall of the product category under low involvement
condition, but that leads to reductions in brand recognition.
Increasing involvement with the product enhanced recall of the
product category and the brand name.
Under high involvement, however, the use of prominent personalities enhanced brand name recognition
The recall and recognition measures were uncorrelated with attitudes or intentions toward Edge razors.
, Increasing Compliance by Improving the Deal: The That’s-Not-All Technique (Burger)
Experiment 1
Test the effect of inducing an additional product into the sales package after giving the price but before
allowing the buyer to respond.
Customers were offered an additional package of cookies at no extra charge after thinking about buying a
cupcake, they didn’t have time to respond.
Prediction: these customers would be more likely to buy the items than would subjects who were told
about the entire package and price together. True
Method
The control group could buy cookies and cupcakes for a certain price. The other group bought cupcakes
and received ‘free’ cookies as extra.
Results
More subjects in the manipulated condition bought cupcakes than in the control condition.
Experiment 2
Reduce the price between the initial price citation and the customer’s response.
Prediction: customers presented with the lower price after being allowed to think about a higher price
would be more likely to buy the product than customers presented only the lower price. True
Method
Customer who asked the price were told a certain price and later it would be reduced. The control group
only heard the lower price.
Results
More subjects in the manipulated condition bought cupcakes than in the control condition.
Why does this work?
1. Reciprocity norm
2. Attitudinal (social) judgments
a. Agreeing or not needs to be considered within the particular frame of reference of the
individual making the judgment; anchor point.
Experiment 3
Prediction: if the seller’s action is seen as something s/her is forced to do, there is no need to reciprocate
and buy the product. But if the price reduction is perceived as a personal gesture, increased compliance
should follow.
Method
Negotiation condition; price reduction.
No-negotiation condition; certain price, other says to sell for lower price but they don’t do that.
Control condition
Results
Subjects in the negotiation condition were more likely to make a purchase than were
subjects in the control condition. A perception of negotiation on the part of the seller is at least partly
responsible for the effectiveness of the that's-not-all effect. Although the appearance of negotiation
increases the effectiveness of the technique, a norm of reciprocity alone may not account for the
effectiveness of the technique.
