title: Affective and cognitive meta-bases of attitudes: Unique effects on information interest and persuasion.
abstract: The authors investigated the predictive utility of people's subjective assessments of whether their evaluations are affect- or cognition driven (i.e., meta-cognitive bases) as separate from whether people's attitudes are actually affect- or cognition based (i.e., structural bases). Study 1 demonstrated that meta-bases uniquely predict interest in affective versus cognitive information above and beyond structural bases and other related variables (i.e., need for cognition and need for affect). In Study 2, meta-bases were shown to account for unique variance in attitude change as a function of appeal type. Finally, Study 3 showed that as people became more deliberative in their judgments, meta-bases increased in predictive utility, and structural bases decreased in predictive utility. These findings support the existence of meta-bases of attitudes and demonstrate that meta-bases are distinguishable from structural bases in their predictive utility.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, National University of Singapore 9 Arts Link, Singapore. psysyhm@nus.edu.sg
authors.forename: Ya Hui Michelle
authors.initials: YH
authors.lastname: See
authors.forename: Richard E
authors.initials: RE
authors.lastname: Petty
authors.forename: Leandre R
authors.initials: LR
authors.lastname: Fabrigar
mesh_terms: D000339:Affect; D001290:Attitude; D003071:Cognition; D030881:Disclosure; D006801:Humans; D010565:Persuasive Communication