One major goal of our lab's research is to discover efficient, effective ways to tailor health behavior change communications to characteristics known about the recipient - such as their health status, perceived risk for health conditions, and motivational orientations.  Much of our research examines the effects of health message framing - that is, communicating the consequences of a health behavior in terms of either the benefits associated with changing it or the risks associated with not changing it - and finds that these two ways of framing the outcomes have vastly different effects on behavior.  Our work seeks to identify the conditions under which each frame is maximally effective in persuading people to make positive changes in their health behavior.

The congruency effect. In one of the first demonstrations of the congruency effect, my colleagues and I discovered that health communications can be much more effective when the frame of the message is congruent with the predominant motivational orientation of the recipient (Mann, Sherman & Updegraff, 2004). We recruited young adults non-adherent to recommendations for daily dental flossing, measured their approach and avoidance motivations with a short checklist, and randomly assigned them to read either a gain- or loss-framed article describing the importance of regular flossing. Consistent with predictions, we found that gain-framed messages (messages that described the benefits of flossing) were more effective for people who were predominantly approach-motivated, whereas loss-framed messages (those that describe the risks of not engaging in a behavior) were more effective for people who were predominantly avoidance-motivated.  In other words, by simply matching the frame of the message to the motivations of the recipient, the communications were 50% more effective in changing behavior.

A number of follow-up studies nailed down mechanisms responsible for these effects. One study identified self-efficacy and intentions as the constructs that mediated the effects of congruency on health behavior change (Sherman, Mann & Updegraff, 2006). Young adults who read a congruently-framed health message reported greater belief in their ability to make the behavior change and greater intentions, which both translated into healthier behavior. But why do congruently-framed messages have these effects? A third study isolated the important role of attention (Updegraff, Sherman, Luyster & Mann, 2007). In this study, we created two versions of our framed messages - one with strong supporting arguments ("Controlled, randomized studies show the benefits of flossing") and another with weak supporting arguments ("Flossing can improve dexterity and coordination in your fingers"), with the aim of understanding the conditions under which people are able to discern the difference between these good and bad reasons. Indeed, only the participants who read a congruently-framed article were paying enough attention to notice the difference. This suggests that using the simple strategy of congruency can increase the likelihood that health communications will be attended to, understood, and ultimately followed.

A summary of this program of research (Sherman, Updegraff & Mann, 2008) appears in the Journal of the American Dental Association.

Current projects. We are expanding this research to understand the role of message framing across a variety of other health behaviors, including cancer screening, exercise, and diet. For example, we are collaborating with Summa Health Systems in Akron on a project funded by the National Cancer Institute.  This 2-year study examines the effectiveness of a tailored approach to message framing for promoting mammography screening among women non-adherent to national screening guidelines. One of the major goals of this project is to examine how women's perceptions of risk (for breast cancer, for problems associated with mammography screenings) moderate the effectiveness of framed messages. 

Kristel Gallagher is working on projects to understand how various forms of message framing can improve people's adherence to exercise. For example, when using gain- and loss-framed health messasges, does it matter what kinds of outcomes the messages focus on? Some interventions try to focus on personal outcomes of exercise (i.e., feeling better) while others focus on social benefits (i.e., looking better). Which combinations of frames and outcomes tend to be the most effective?

Another current line of research examines the underlying mechanisms responsible for various classes of framing effects, such as matching the frame to the motivational orientations of the recipient (Mann, Sherman & Updegraff, 2004) or matching the frame to the function of the behavior (e.g., Rothman & Salovey, 1997).

 

Sherman, D. K., Updegraff, J. A., & Mann, T. L. (in press). Improving oral health behavior: A social psychological approach. Journal of the American Dental Association.

Updegraff, J. A., Sherman, D. K., *Luyster, F. S., & Mann, T. L. (2007). The effects of message quality and congruency on perceptions of tailored health communications. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 43, 248-256. [PDF]

Sherman, D. K., Mann, T. L., & Updegraff, J. A. (2006). Approach/avoidance orientation, message framing, and health behavior: Understanding the congruency effect. Motivation and Emotion, 30, 164-168. [PDF]

Mann, T. L., Sherman, D. S., & Updegraff, J. A. (2004). Dispositional motivations and message framing: A test of the congruency hypothesis. Health Psychology, 23, 330-334. [PDF]

* Indicates KSU student author.