Bedtime Stories that Work: The Effect of Protagonist Liking on Narrative Persuasion.
The experiment described in this article draws on affective disposition theory to clarify how protagonist likeability influences participants' sleep hygiene-related self-efficacy and outcome expectations immediately after media exposure and 3 days later. Results indicate that protagonist likeability is an important factor in narrative persuasion. Protagonist likeability did not directly affect participants' sleep hygiene-related self-efficacy immediately postexposure, but it did influence self-efficacy 3 days later. The dislikeable protagonist influenced self-efficacy more than the likeable protagonist. Further, protagonist likeability did not directly affect outcome expectations either immediately postexposure or 3 days later. However, mediation analyses demonstrated that protagonist likeability indirectly influenced both self-efficacy and outcome expectations via perceived liking of the protagonist immediately after exposure and 3 days later. Implications of these findings are further discussed.
a School of Communication , The Ohio State University.
Melissa J
MJ
Robinson
a School of Communication , The Ohio State University.
Silvia
S
Knobloch-Westerwick
D004644:Emotions; D005260:Female; D006293:Health Promotion / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D033262:Narration; D010565:Persuasive Communication; D011582:Psychological Theory; D020377:Self Efficacy; D000070263:Sleep Hygiene; D055815:Young Adult