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"An Inconvenient Truth" is an Academy Award-winning documentary about global warming presented by Al Gore. This documentary is appropriate for a lesson on fear appeals and the extended parallel process model (EPPM). The EPPM is concerned with the effects of perceived threat and efficacy on behavior change. Perceived threat is composed of an individual's perceptions of both "susceptibility" and "severity," and perceived efficacy is comprised of an individual's perceptions of both "response-efficacy" and "self-efficacy." According to the EPPM, three outcomes are possible depending on one's levels of perceived threat and efficacy: no response, fear control response, and danger control response. In this activity, students will define key principles from the extended parallel process model and will demonstrate these principles used in the documentary "An Inconvenient Truth." Courses: Persuasion, Health Communication, Political Communication, Public Speaking, Communication Theory. (Contains 1 table. A combined section of references and suggested readings is provided. )

To authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1460-2466.2008.01407.x Byline: Michael D. Slater (1), Catherine E. Goodall (1), Andrew F. Hayes (1) Abstract: Evidence for media effects in survey research often depends upon measures of self-reported attention to various types of media content, under the assumption that such attention measures gauge the extent of cognitive processing of content. However, effects associated with self-reports of attention might often be due to reverse causation (the attitude or knowledge tested as the outcome might in fact give rise to self-reports of greater attention) or third variable effects. To better assess whether self-reported attention to content actually measures differential processing of content, an experiment was conducted in the context of media influences on health and safety risk perceptions. A pool of 120 eligible news stories concerning violent crime, car crashes, and other unintentional injuries was randomly selected from a national random sample of such news coverage. These stories were manipulated to contain or not contain reference to alcohol as a contributing factor in the incident. Consistent with predictions and prior cross-sectional survey results, self-reports of attention and the exposure treatment interacted in estimating concern about alcohol-related risks, with the pattern of results suggesting that between-participant differences in self-reports of attention in fact reflected differences in processing of the message. Methodological advantages of using random samples of messages in experiments for inference are also discussed. Abstract (Spanish): Resumen Los Auto-reportes sobre la Atencion de Noticias Evaluan el Proceso Diferencial del Contenido de los Medios: Un Experimento sobre las Percepciones de Riesgo Utilizando una Muestra Aleatoria Noticias Locales y de Accidentes de los Estados Unidos La evidencia sobre los efectos de los medios en la investigacion de encuesta depende a menudo de las medidas de auto-reportes sobre la atencion a varios tipos de contenido de los medios, bajo la asuncion que esas medidas de atencion evaluan la extension del procesamiento cognitivo del contenido. No obstante, los efectos asociados con los auto-reportes podrian a menudo ser debidos a la causacion reversa (la actitud o el conocimiento puesto a prueba dado que el resultado podria en realidad elevar la gran atencion de los auto-reportes) o los efectos de la tercera variable. Para evaluar mejor si la atencion al contenido en los auto-reportes mide en realidad el proceso diferencial de contenido, un experimento fue conducido en el contexto de las influencias de los medios sobre la salud y las percepciones de riesgo de seguridad. Un fondo de 120 historias elegibles de noticias acerca de crimenes violentos, accidentes automovilisticos, y otros accidentes no intencionales fueron seleccionadas aleatoriamente de una muestra nacional de cobertura de noticias de ese tipo. Estas historias fueron manipuladas para contener o no referencia a alcohol como un factor contribuyente del incidente. Consistente con nuestras predicciones y los resultados previos de una encuesta transversal, los auto-reportes de atencion y la exposicion al tratamiento interactuaron en estimar la preocupacion sobre los riesgos relacionados con el alcohol, la pauta de resultados sugiere diferencias entre participantes en los auto-reportes de atencion reflejando de hecho diferencias en el procesamiento del mensaje. Las ventajas metodologicas de usar muestras aleatorias de mensajes en experimentos para inferencia son discutidas tambien. Author Affiliation: (1)School of Communication, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 43210 Article note: Michael D. Slater; e-mail: slater.59@osu.edu

Alcohol advertisements may influence impulsive, risky behaviors indirectly, via automatically activated attitudes toward alcohol. Results from an experiment in which participants were exposed to either four alcohol advertisements, four control advertisements, or four drunk driving public service advertisements (PSAs) suggested that alcohol advertisements had more measurable effects on implicit than on explicit attitude measures. Moreover, there were significant indirect paths from alcohol advertisement exposure through automatically activated alcohol attitudes on willingness to engage in risky alcohol-related behaviors, notably drinking and driving. A mechanism that may explain how these advertisements activate automatic, nondeliberative alcohol attitudes was investigated. Associative evidence was found supportive of an evaluative conditioning mechanism, in which positive responses to an alcohol advertisement may lead to more positive automatically activated attitudes toward alcohol.