Inoculation in Competitive Framing: Effects of Messages About Soda Taxes Under Competition Over Time

• In Event: Framing and Framing Effects: New Perspectives

Abstract

This study reports on a two-wave longitudinal, competitive framing experiment (N = 3,118), testing the impact of exposure to several combinations of pro-tax frames, anti-tax frames, and inoculation as a counterframing strategy, relative to a no-exposure control group. Respondents exposed to an inoculation message that illuminated the motives and counter-arguments of soda companies elicited more favorable opinions of soda taxes after exposure compared with those not exposed to a frame. Inoculation effects on policy opinions appeared to occur via two, complementary psychological mechanisms: changes in beliefs about soda companies (the entity described as the attitudinal threat in the inoculation message) and changes in the salience of beliefs about soda companies in shaping support for the tax. Inoculation did not, however, produce sustained resistance to subsequent strong anti-tax frame exposure in an asymmetric competitive framing context.

Authors

• Jeff Niederdeppe, Cornell U

• Sarah E. Gollust, U of Oregon

• Colleen L. Barry, Johns Hopkins U