Opinion Change and Communicator-communicates Similarity and Dissimilarity

Investigations of similarity and opinion change seem to have inadvertently fostered the conclusion that any communicator-communicatee similarity will lead to opinion change, and that the resultant change is due directly to similarity and not to increased feelings of attractiveness for similar communicators. It was hypothesized and confirmed that, when communicator attractiveness is controlled, communicator-communicatee similarities which are relevant to the communicator's influence attempt effect considerably more opinion change than do similarities which are irrelevant to the communication. In a 2nd experiment, it was further hypothesized and confirmed that communicatorcommunicatee dissimilarities relevant to a communication, in which an opinion taken by the communicatee prior to the communication is advocated, effect opinion change away from the position advocated by the communicator (and initially by the communicatee himself). Communicator-communicatee dissimilarities irrelevant to the communication appear to produce no such "boomerang" effect.