Do Loss-Framed Persuasive Messages Engender Greater Message Processing Than Do Gain-Framed Messages? A Meta-Analytic Review

Greater fear arousal is associated with greater engagement with persuasive messages, and negative information and events are more potent than their positive counterparts. Hence loss-framed persuasive appeals, which emphasize the undesirable outcomes of noncompliance with the communicator’s recommendations, should elicit greater message processing than do gain-framed appeals, which emphasize the desirable outcomes of compliance. But a meta-analytic review (based on 42 effect sizes, N 1⁄4 6,378) finds that gainframed messages engender slightly but significantly greater message engagement than do loss-framed messages. This effect is apparently not a result of whether the appeals refer to obtaining or averting negative (e.g., ‘‘skin cancer’’) rather than positive (e.g., ‘‘attractive skin’’) outcomes.