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International Journal of Public Opinion Research Advance Access originally published online on March 18, 2005
International Journal of Public Opinion Research 2005 17(4):473-483; doi:10.1093/ijpor/edh077
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International Journal of Public Opinion Research Vol. 17 No. 4 © The Author 2005. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The World Association for Public Opinion Research. All rights reserved.

Self-Enhancement Motivation as a Third Variable in the Relationship Between First- and Third-Person Effects

Patrick C. Meirick

Patrick Meirick is an assistant professor in the Department of Communication at the University of Oklahoma. His research deals mainly with political communication and social cognition.

Address correspondence to Patrick C. Meirick, Department of Communication, University of Oklahoma, 610 Elm Avenue, Norman, OK 73019, USA, E-mail: meirick@ou.edu

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

It has been widely argued that there is a motivational explanation for the third-person effect (e.g. Gunther & Mundy, 1993; Henriksen & Flora, 1999; Hoorens & Ruiter, 1996; Perloff, 1999; White & Dillon, 2000). The logic is intuitively appealing: People can bolster their self-esteem by thinking of themselves as relatively invulnerable to undesirable media influence. The logic also applies to the first-person effect: People can self-enhance by seeing themselves as relatively pro-social and open-minded in considering desirable messages.

Most studies advancing and testing these arguments have relied upon a manipulation of message desirability, yielding results in which the third-person effect is muted (Eveland & McLeod, 1999; Innes & Zeitz, 1988; Gunther & Thorson, 1992) or reversed (Cohen & Davis, 1991; Henriksen & Flora, 1999; Hoorens & Ruiter, 1996; Price, Tewksbury & Huang, 1998) for desirable messages. These studies . . . [Full Text of this Article]


   RECENT EXPERIMENTAL AND CORRELATIONAL RESEARCH
 
MANIPULATING THE NEED FOR SELF-ENHANCEMENT
CORRELATING THE THIRD-PERSON EFFECT AND OPTIMISTIC BIAS
MANIPULATING SELF-ENHANCEMENT AND CORRELATING FIRST- AND THIRD-PERSON EFFECTS

   SELF-AFFIRMATION THEORY
 

   STUDY ONE
 
METHOD
RESULTS
DISCUSSION FOR STUDY ONE

   STUDY TWO
 
METHOD
RESULTS

   OVERALL DISCUSSION
 

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[Abstract] [PDF]