Counterproductive Effects of Repeated Exposure to Health Campaign Messages: Evidence From a Neuroimaging Study

• In Event: HIGH-DENSITY: Message Effects Research in Health Contexts

Abstract

Although sufficient exposure to health messages is instrumental to learning, too much exposure to messages on the same topic may be counterproductive. In this study, we examined the effects of message dose on four brain regions of interest (ROIs) associated with key processes that facilitate or inhibit persuasion. Adolescents between 14-17 years old without established smoking behaviors (N=37) underwent an fMRI session, in which they viewed 12 randomly-ordered anti-smoking video PSAs, created as part the FDA’s The Real Cost campaign. Results suggested that as exposure increased, 1) activity within the “valuation” ROIs sharply decreased with the several initial doses and flattened out at a low activity level afterwards; 2) although activity within the “deliberation” ROI did not significantly fluctuate over the course of exposure, significant increases in the “counterarguing” ROI activity was observed; 3) activity within the “attention” ROIs did not drop as we expected, but rather was slightly increasing.

Authors

• Jiaying Liu, University of Georgia

• Jiyeon So, University of Georgia

• Rui Pei, U of Pennsylvania

• Emily Falk, U of Pennsylvania