PSY20016 : Social Psychology - Risks of Climate Change - Psychology Assignment Help

Assignment Task :

BACKGROUND
Climate change is the most critical environmental concern the world is currently facing. A challenging aspect of climate change is that solutions are difficult to implement due to obstacles from politicians and industry. Acting on climate change is important, given the consequences of not doing so (e.g., Hamilton, 2010). While the level of public support for action related to climate change is increasing, the level of concern expressed by the public is arguably not commensurate with the scope and severity of the problem.
Previous research on attitudes toward climate change has focussed on factors like individual differences (e.g., Yu & Yu, 2017), political ideology (e.g., Whitmarsh, 2011), and perceived risks of climate change. An important factor which has received less attention is the role that the source of a message plays in influencing the public’s trust in the message, and thus attitude change.

The perceived credibility and trust in the source of a persuasive message is argued to be important when it comes to attitude change (Hovland & Weiss, 1951; Pornpitakpan, 2004; Tormala, Briñol, & Petty, 2006). Research has demonstrated that the public is more likely to change their attitude if they feel that the source is trustworthy and credible (that is, they have sufficient expertise in the topic). However, there has been little research focused on understanding why a source is trusted. This is despite the acknowledged importance of the role of trust in shaping the publics’ views on issues such as climate change (Malka, et al., 2009).

This research report is designed to answer the question: Does perceived self-interest of a source (i.e., author) influence the public’s trust in their argument? More specifically, it will test the idea that when a climate change related message is presented by a source who is perceived to have a vested interest in the message, the message will be trusted less than when climate change related message is being presented by a source who is not seen to have a vested interest in the message. In particular, it will test the idea that the source’s perceived vested interest in the message will activate a heuristic. A lay theory of motivation is a heuristic that allows a person to make a quick judgement call about how much they trust a message based on their determination of the motives of the source (e.g., perceived selfinterest).

The study will also focus on the role of epistemic style in predicting trust in the message.
Epistemic style is an individual difference variable that captures a person’s characteristic way of processing information and making decisions. Within the Epistemic Preference Indicator
(Elphinstone, Farrugia, Critchley & Eigenberger, 2014), thinking is differentiated into two epistemic styles – the intellective position, and the default position. The intellective positive(IP) describes a preference for complex and effortful thinking, whereas the default position(DP) describes the use of less effortful thinking styles. The current study will test whether epistemic preference (specifically high IP vs low IP) will moderate the impact of the source’s perceived self-interest on trust in the message. Specifically, it is argued that individuals high in IP are less likely to be influenced by source characteristics (i.e., perceived self-interest of the source) and more influenced by the content of the message. On the other hand, it is expected that individuals low in IP will be less likely to focus on the content of the message and will be more swayed by the characteristics of the source.

THE CURRENT STUDY
Aim:
The present study has two main aims:
• to investigate whether perceived self-interest of the source impacts trust in the message, and whether this effect differs for individuals high in IP vs low in IP and
• to investigate whether trust in the message is related to general concern about climate change, and whether this relationship different for individuals high in IP vs individuals low in IP.

Design:
In Week 1, you completed an experimental study. In the study, all participants read an article that discussed the importance of increasing public funding for research and development of electric vehicles. Half of all participants read that the article was written by an engineering researcher employed by GreenFutures. GreenFutures was described as a company focussed on developing technology to improve electric cars. Thus, this represents the Vested Interest condition. The other half of participants read that the article was written by an engineering researcher employed by the Australian Coal Association. The Australian Coal Association was described as an industry body who looks after its member companies - the black coal producers in Australia. Thus, this represents the Non-Vested Interest condition. Essentially, what was manipulated between the two conditions was the perceived vested interest of the source, and participants were randomly assigned to view one of these two conditions. In addition, participants also completed the Epistemic Preference Indicator Revised (Elphinstone et al. 2014). A median split will be used to create two groups to differentiate people high in IP and low in IP1
 

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