Fear appeals are a strategy that maximize persuasive effectiveness based on threat and efficacy levels, taking into account both the emotional and cognitive responses of the audience.
Fear appeals persuade audiences by emphasizing the harmful consequences of not following a message’s recommendations, and have been studied by persuasion researchers since the early 1950s. Fear tactics are widely used in advertising, health campaigns, political messages, and more. These persuasive tactics can be very effective in getting people to change their behavior, and they have a particularly powerful effect on people who are risk-averse. Representing the earliest research, Janis focused on the persuasive power of fear phrases, which had not been addressed in previous studies. He conducted an experiment in which he presented three different levels of fear phrases to recipients and found that moderate fear phrases had the greatest persuasive effect.
Levendahl, who furthered the study of fear appeals, criticized Janis’s work for focusing on the emotional side of human behavior, arguing that the effectiveness of fear appeals is not only related to the emotional response of the recipient, but also to the cognitive response. He called the emotional response the “fear control response” and the cognitive response the “risk control response. When the latter is triggered, the recipient will follow the recommendations of the fear phrase, but when the former is triggered, the recipient will try to ignore the danger in the fear phrase in order to control the emotion of fear induced by the fear phrase. This suggests that the persuasive effectiveness of fear appeals does not depend solely on the intensity of fear.
Synthesizing these previous studies, Witty first identified “threat” and “efficacy” as two factors that influence the persuasive effectiveness of fear statements. A scare tactic has a high level of threat if the recipient perceives that the risk in the scare tactic is something they can experience and that the risk is high. A fear statement has a high level of threat if the recipient believes that fulfilling the recommendations in the fear statement will prevent his or her risk and that he or she has the ability to fulfill the recommendations. A club once told its members, “You must attend meetings. Failure to do so will result in the loss of your membership.’ Losing your membership is a high threat to someone who has a strong attachment to the group. And when he feels it is not difficult for him to attend the meetings of the club, the advice in the notice gives him a high level of efficacy.
In this context, increasing the persuasiveness of fear appeals requires a customized approach that takes into account the way the message is delivered and the characteristics of the recipient. For example, health-related fear claims need to be presented in different ways for different age groups and health conditions. In an anti-smoking campaign targeting young people, it may be effective to emphasize the negative impact on appearance in addition to highlighting the risk of lung cancer. On the other hand, in a campaign targeting older adults, it’s important to include positive messages about living longer and spending more time with family.
Witty relates these two factors to Levendahl’s two control responses, drawing the following conclusions When levels of both threat and efficacy are high, the risk control response is triggered, and when levels of threat are high but efficacy is low, the fear control response is triggered. However, when the level of threat is low, the receiver feels that the threat has no effect on him or her, and there is no response to the fear apparatus, regardless of the level of efficacy. This conclusion was an important stepping stone for further research because it unified theories of fear appeals.
Recent research has also highlighted the importance of how and through which messages are delivered in order to translate fear cues into actual behavior change. For example, using visuals or stories to communicate fear can be more engaging to the audience. Visuals in scare tactics can reinforce the impact of the message and bring the emotion of fear to life. Furthermore, with the rise of digital and social media, there are new ways to amplify the effectiveness of scare tactics. This further expands their reach and impact, and makes them an effective persuasion tactic in a variety of fields.
In conclusion, fear tactics are more than just fear mongering; they are complex persuasive strategies that take into account both the cognitive and emotional responses of the audience. Fear appeals to both the emotions and cognition of the audience, maximizing the persuasive power of the message. As such, fear props remain an important area of research and development. There is still a need for research on the various applications of fear and how to maximize its effectiveness. This will allow persuasive messages to become more sophisticated and effective.
