Persuasive Communication - How Audiences Decide. 2nd Edition

228 Understanding Intuitive Decision Making

Brain Regions Activated. Frame-congruent choices, such as those described above, are emo-

tionally satisfying. Neuroscientists fi nd that amygdala activation, which is associated with an

increased emotional response to information, is greater when subjects make frame-congruent

choices than when they make frame-incongruent ones (see Figure 3.5 , p. 108).^234 By contrast,

frame-incongruent choices generate feelings of internal confl ict. Neuroscientists fi nd that frame-

incongruent messages produce greater activation in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). The

ACC is connected both to the amygdala and to the frontal and parietal lobes. ACC activity during

frame-incongruent choices refl ects the detection of a confl ict between the responses of the emo-

tional and rational systems. Any such confl ict makes audiences less susceptible to framing effects.

Activity in the orbital frontal cortex and the medial prefrontal cortex predicts reduced susceptibil-

ity to framing effects altogether.^235

Framing Effects: The Power of Analogy

Analogies can serve as powerful decision frames: They can constrain the set of alternatives the

audience considers and can infl uence the audience’s evaluations of those alternatives.^236 Analogies

have been shown to infl uence the decisions of many different audiences, including consumers,^237

voters,^238 mock jurors,^239 and investors.^240

Analogies work by activating a well-understood schema in one domain that can organize

attribute information about a little-understood target in another domain.^241 For example,

what most audiences already know about the structure of the solar system—it has a number of

small planets that revolve around a large central star—can be used to explain the structure of

the atom—atoms have a number of small electrons that spin around a relatively large central

nucleus.

Different analogies provide different frames and lead to different decisions. For example,

consumers who read an ad that made an analogy between a personal digital assistant (PDA)

and a librarian formed a more favorable impression of the PDA than consumers who read an

ad that made an analogy between the PDA and a secretary.^242 Similarly, consumers who read

an ad that made an analogy between a digital camera and a fi lm-based camera had a greater

intention to buy the digital camera than those who read a similar ad that made an analogy

between a digital camera and a scanner.^243

Analogies can lead audiences to make biased predictions if some feature of the current situation

that has no diagnostic signifi cance has triggered the analogy. For example, football scouts sometimes

make irrelevant analogies with pro football stars when judging the talent of rookies. Football scouts

tend to choose rookies who win awards named after a star football player rather than rookies who

win equally prestigious but differently named awards.^244

Analogies are often used to frame the terms of political debates^245 despite their tendency to

undermine the role of accurate information in determining causes and effects. For example,

many U.S. policy makers used two analogies extensively to decide on military strategy during the

pre-Vietnam era: (1) Vietnam will be another Korean War, and (2) the U.S. experience in Vietnam

will be like the French experience in Vietnam in the 1950s.^246 Other policy makers used the French

analogy to argue against the appropriateness of the Korean analogy. They conducted this argument

by comparing the two analogies to each other.^247

Later, in the 1960s, policy makers used the “domino theory” analogy to frame the debate about

Vietnam.^248 The success of this analogy played an important role in the decision of the United

States to enter into the Vietnam War.^249 Interestingly, the policy makers themselves never fully rec-

ognized the role of the analogy in framing the debate about Vietnam.^250