This manuscript reports 2 experiments that were conducted to test and extend the work of J. P. Dillard and L. Shen (2005) examining the cognitive and affective processes involved in psychological reactance. In particular, the studies reported here (a) examined the best-fitting model of reactance processes and (b) tested 3 factors that may affect reactance including argument quality, severity of...

Previous research has demonstrated a considerable amount of negative consequences resulting from psychological reactance. The purpose of this study was to explore opportunities to reduce the amount of reactance. Using the method of perspective taking as an intervention, the current study of 196 Austrians and 198 Filipinos examined whether reactance could be reduced and whether individualists an...

In two experimental studies we explore to what extent the general effects of positive and negative framing also apply to positive and negative persuasion. Our results reveal that negative persuasion induces substantially higher levels of skepticism and awareness of being subjected to a persuasion attempt. Furthermore, we demonstrate that in positive persuasion, more claims lead to stronger pers...

In this article the influence of higher frequency effects in addition to a special damper design on the electrical behavior of a synchronous generator main exciter machine is investigated. On the one hand these machines are often highly stressed by harmonics from the bridge rectifier thus facing additional eddy current losses. On the other hand the switching may cause the excitation of dangerou...

Autonomy, often associated with an open and reflective evaluation of experience, is sometimes confused with reactance, which indicates resistance to persuasion attempts. Two studies examined a path model in which autonomy and reactance predicted motivation following the provision of anonymous or source-identified health-risk information, via the mediation of perceived threat to decision-making ...

This paper describes the construction and empirical evaluation of an instrument for measuring state reactance, the Salzburger State Reactance (SSR) Scale. The results of a confirmatory factor analysis supported a hypothesized three-factor structure: experience of reactance, aggressive behavioral intentions, and negative attitudes. Correlations with divergent and convergent measures support the ...

Guided by the extended parallel process model (EPPM) and reactance theory, this study examined the relationship between efficacy beliefs, reactance, and adult smokers' responses to pictorial health warning labels (HWL) on cigarette packaging, including whether efficacy beliefs or reactance modify the relationship between HWL responses and subsequent smoking cessation behavior. Four waves of dat...

Threats to our freedom are part of our daily social interactions. They are accompanied by an aversive state of motivational arousal, called reactance, which leads people to strive to reestablish their threatened freedom. This is especially the case if the threat seems to be illegitimate in nature. However, reactance theory suggests that reactance should also be aroused when people are exposed t...

OBJECTIVE Some researchers have raised concerns that pictorial health warning labels (HWLs) on cigarette packages may lead to message rejection and reduced effectiveness of HWL messages. This study aimed to determine how state reactance (i.e., negative affect due to perceived manipulation) in response to both pictorial and text-only HWLs is associated with other types of HWL responses and with ...