How the functional approach to attitudes might inform your campaign

Imagine you are hired as a social psychologist to create a persuasive campaign to change people’s attitudes toward a social issue and to bring about positive social change. The social issues I selected is the ‘leftover women stigma in Chinese society’.

This essay is the second half of the previous assignment. In the essay, please follow the structure as below:

 V. How the functional approach to attitudes might inform your campaign?

For this question, please explain two points:

1. Value expressive function of attitude: Women from different background in the video represents audience core values, self-images, and beliefs to the world. (200 words)

When creating adverts, one of the consideration advertisers make is determining what motivates their consumers. Consumers are likely to develop positive attitude toward an object which can boost their self-esteem, elevate their status and help them fit in.

As the value-expressive approach describes, the attitudes allow people to express their core values, self-images, and beliefs to the world (Katz, 1960). It helps people to communicate their social status, lifestyle, personality to others. The value expressive functions help individuals to express their central held values thus establishing their identity and gaining them social approval, therefore, showing what they stand for and who they are (Solomon, 2008).

Shavitt (1990) describes the attitude can serve as a tool to maintain social identity and self-esteem, which means it mediates the relationship with others and creates one’s identity. In addition, Shavitt (1990) describes the attitude can serve as a tool to maintain social identity and self-esteem, which means it mediates the relationship with others and creates one’s identity.

2. Utilitarian Function of Attitudes: Celebrities’s encouragement in the video plays as a rewards. (100 words)

According to the Utilitarian Function of Attitudes, people use attitudes as ways to maximize rewards and minimize punishment. In other words, purchasing something because it brings forth a specific benefit (Shavitt, 1990). In the video, celebrities will encourage audience to respect women and stop using the term ‘leftover women’. Let people feel that if they do so, they will be praised by celebrity!
VI. How attitude formation and maintenance might inform your campaign?

For this question, please explain three points:

1. Explain that the “influencer blog posts” strategy is based on cognitive-based attitude formation. ( 200 words)

Use knowledge as a tool to persuade audience, the campaign will invite different influencers (fashion/ music/ marketing/ feminist) to write blog posts about women empowerment, and explain why using the term ‘leftover women’ is a discrimination.

2. Explain that the online video strategy is based on “affective-based formation” and “classical conditioning theory“. ( 200 words)

Studies show that affective factors will be influential for attitudes arising in response to need gratification or deprivation, threats to the self-image, or unconscious motives (Edwards, 1990).The campaign aim to give single women confidence, boosting the status of women through raising awareness, give them power to feel free to develop their personal abilities and make choices without the limitations set by strict gender roles
Classical conditioning: In the video, celebrities will urge the society to stop using the discriminated term ‘leftover women’. This strategy aims to create a negative feeling associated with the term ‘leftover women’, in order to prevent people from using this word.

3. Explain that the exhibition installation strategy is based on the “mere exposure effect”. ( 200 words)

The campaign will hold an one month exhibition in Shanghai in order to create mere exposure effect, “the more you see or hear something, you more you like it.” In the exhibition, video series and women’s statement will be shown. It can also be a real platform for women to meet, take part in the campaign and listen to talks on the topic.

In the mere exposure effect, a positive attitude can develop toward objects the more frequently you are exposed to them (Zajonc, 1968). These processes have important implications for attitude formation, especially attitudes toward members of groups.

 VII. How you might measure attitude change that occurs as a result of your campaign. (200 words)

Before and after the campaign, use Self-Report Measures of Attitudes surveys or opinion polls with the target audience to measure attitude change, knowledge and awareness.

VIII. Explain methodological issues that may arise in measuring attitude change as a result of your campaign. (200 words)

Collecting information through a self-report, however, has its limitations. People are often biased when they report on their own experiences.

IX. Explain factors you then would need to consider to predict behavior based on the attitude change. ( 150 words)

Kraus, S. (1995): “Research has shown that numerous factors can influence the strength and consistency of this relationship. These factors include, but are not limited to, attitude strength, attitude function, individual personality variables, and issues of research design and measurement.

The findings indicated that attitudes correlated with a future behavior more strongly when they were easy to recall (accessible) and stable over time (Kraus, S, 1995). Because of increased accessibility, attitudes more strongly predicted future behavior when participants had direct experience with the attitude object and reported their attitudes frequently.”X. Conclusion: Please describe the social change implications of your campaign: “Empowering women can improve the effectiveness of the society. “(150 words)

Gender equality is a indicator of sustainable development (Alvarez and Lopez, 2013). Stevens (2010) “gender inequalities bring high economic costs and leading to environmental degradation around the world. The stereotyped perception of society towards women is detrimental to women as well as to the development of the entire country (King and Mason, 2001)

“influencer blog posts“