Week 10 Interpersonal Influence Questions Response Read the articles and answer the questions. Please answer carefully with appropriate examples. It doesn’

Week 10 Interpersonal Influence Questions Response Read the articles and answer the questions. Please answer carefully with appropriate examples. It doesn’t have to be as formal as an essay. No citation required. 1. How are we influenced by everyday interactions with others? Parents? Children?
Friends? Partners?
2. Are persuasion & conflict two separate communication contexts? Or the same?
3. In what ways could we teach or train people to use person-centered messages?
What are some challenges that arise in using person-centered messages when
you disagree with the other person?
4. Why do validating messages work better than invalidating messages? And what
might be an example of each?
5. What types of influence strategies are you seeing on social media? Do they
seem effective/ineffective? Does it matter what the goal is? ALSO – please use a
content warning for messages that need it (example: CW: Violence). Think very
carefully about any images you might share. If you feel this thread might
introduce more trauma than you are currently willing to deal with, please feel
free to keep your participation to the other questions.
Health Communication, 27: 399–407, 2012
Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
ISSN: 1041-0236 print / 1532-7027 online
DOI: 10.1080/10410236.2011.595771
Employing Interpersonal Influence to Promote Multivitamin Use
Franklin J. Boster
Department of Communication
Michigan State University
Christopher J. Carpenter
Department of Communication
Western Illinois University
Kyle R. Andrews
Department of Communication
Northern Illinois University
Paul A. Mongeau
Department of Communication
Arizona State University
Boster, Kotowski, Andrews, and Serota (2011) proposed that superdiffusers are well connected, persuasive, and a maven in a content area. They proposed that superdiffusers, if
recruited, could promote the adoption of health practices. In this article a model of this process is presented, and an intervention designed to test the efficacy of this influence strategy is
introduced. Specifically, superdiffusers were recruited to persuade their peers to take a daily
multivitamin. Evidence was found consistent with the intervention’s effectiveness.
Scholars examining the diffusion of information and behavior have long examined the influence of media and interpersonal message channels. Recent research on communication
campaigns has highlighted the complex interplay between
both aspects of influence, and has called attention to the need
for additional theoretical research to specify the relationship between communication campaigns and interpersonal
talk (Southwell & Yzer, 2007, 2009). The empirical research
conducted thus far demonstrates that interpersonal interaction is often related to the primary dependent variables
targeted by campaign designers. For example, media exposure on science topics was found to predict perceived topic
understanding, which in turn predicted an increased prevalence in relevant conversations (Southwell & Torres, 2006).
Such media-motivated interpersonal talk has been found to
affect cognitive and behavioral outcomes, such as attempts
Correspondence should be addressed to Franklin J. Boster, Department
of Communication, Michigan State University, 567 Communication Arts
and Sciences, East Lansing, MI 48824. E-mail: boster@msu.edu
to quit smoking (Hafstad & Aaro, 1997; Hafstad, Aaro, &
Langmark, 1996; Dunlop, Wakefield, & Kashima, 2008),
perceptions of personal risk (Morton & Duck, 2006), and
political participation and knowledge (Cho, Shah, McLeod,
McLeod, Scholl, & Gotlieb, 2009).
It has long been known that some people are more influential within social networks than others (Rogers, 2003).
Designing campaigns that can induce influential people to
engage in interpersonal talk, then, has the potential to be
a particularly promising strategy. Originally, those studying
the diffusion of innovations identified the influential members of particular networks after the fact (Katz & Lazarsfeld,
1955). More recently scholars have begun to identify a priori
the influential members of a network and seek their assistance in spreading ideas and behavior (Kelley et al., 1997;
Miller, Klotz, & Eckholdt, 1998; Schuster et al., 2006; see
Bertrand, 2004, for a review). Interventions such as that
of Kelley et al. often rely on insiders nominating opinion
leaders of small, well-defined communities. Although these
interventions have had some success, applying the opinion
400 BOSTER ET AL.
leader concept to larger, more heterogeneous communities
requires a more systematic method of identifying opinion
leaders.
IDENTIFYING THE EXTREMELY INFLUENTIAL
Traditional measures of opinion leadership (e.g., Rogers
& Cartano, 1962) do not include key aspects of what
makes an opinion leader influential (Baumgarten, 1975;
Chan & Misra, 1990; Fitzgerald, Ferlie, Wood, & Hawkins,
2002; Tschoertner, Jers, & Schenk, 2006). In order to build
upon the traditional concept of an opinion leader, Boster,
Kotowski, Andrews, and Serota (2011) developed the concept of the superdiffuser, someone able to influence many
others to accept new ideas or engage in novel action. Based
on their review of opinion leadership, they concluded that a
superdiffuser must be highly connected, highly persuasive,
and highly expert (i.e., a maven) in some domain.
According to Boster et al. (2011), someone connected
highly must be sociable and enjoy meeting new people.
Such persons are often a bridge or a liaison between disparate groups. Their ability to access different groups of
people gives connectors the ability to target a large number
of people when they choose to attempt to diffuse an idea or
practice.
A superdiffuser must also be highly persuasive (Boster
et al., 2011). Such persons are highly skilled at arguing for a
position (see Carpenter et al., 2009). They are able to frame
arguments effectively, tailoring them to have maximum suasory impact on particular people or groups of people. They
particularly enjoy argumentation, and will seek out opportunities to persuade others. These superior persuasion skills
enable them to convince many of those with whom they
interact.
Finally, a superdiffuser must be a maven in a particular domain (Boster et al., 2011). Although the attributes of
connection and persuasion are not domain specific, mavens
are extremely knowledgeable about a particular content area,
such as healthy lifestyles, politics, or popular music. They
enjoy giving people advice in their area of expertise and
people often seek their advice in the maven’s domain of
expertise. This attribute is pivotal to the diffusion process
because the maven’s combination of content specific credibility and knowledge provides the factual foundation that
enables superdiffusers to craft effective arguments promoting ideas or action. The original Boster et al. validation
study examined mavens within a health context; subsequent
research has found evidence of political mavens as well
(Serota, Carpenter, Andrews, & Boster, 2009).
Boster et al. (2011) developed items to assess each of
these three attributes, found them to fit the hypothesized
three-factor measurement model, and provided construct
validation evidence for each of the three attributes. They
defined a superdiffuser as someone high on each of the three
attributes, with “high” being given the statistical definition
of scoring at or above the 75th percentile. In a subsequent
experiment they found that their measures were able to
capture aspects of opinion leadership that previous scales
failed to include. For example, Carpenter et al. (2009)
demonstrated that superdiffusers produced more complex
arguments and were better able to adapt their arguments to
the characteristics of their target audience.
The Boster et al. (2011) measures of the attributes of a
superdiffuser permit highly influential people in large, diffuse communities to be identified. If those superdiffusers
could be recruited to advocate for a change in health behavior, a positive change in the behavior of the members of
that community would be predicted to result. The manner in which such an intervention is expected to operate is
explicated subsequently.
The Dynamics of Superdiffuser Effects
Some proportion, α, of a target population, P, may have
adopted the advocated health practice prior to the implementation of the intervention. Using this notation the number of
preexperiment adopters is given by αP, where 0 ≤ α ≤ 1.
Suppose that prior to the implementation of the intervention a survey designed to identify those high on the
connector, persuader, and maven scales is administered to
the target population. Furthermore, suppose that all persons
high on these three measures are identified, with .05 being
approximately the proportion of these superdiffusers in the
population estimated from prior research (Boster et al.,
2011). Further suppose that these .05P persons agree both
to adopt the advocated health practice and to attempt to
diffuse the advocated health practice to persons to whom
they are connected. Denoting as A0 those who adopt the
advocated health practice prior to the implementation of the
intervention,
A0 = f (those who have adopted preexperiment, number of
superdiffusers)
= those who have adopted + number of superdiffusers
= αP + .05P
(1)
Expression (1) presumes that the set of superdiffusers and
the set of early adopters do not overlap. Although this
assumption is likely false, α is likely to be so small in
applications of interest that violating it will not reduce the
predictive power of the model substantially.
To the extent that the intervention is effective,
superdiffusers would convince other members of the target population to adopt the advocated health practice. After
the implementation of the intervention the number of persons in P now practicing the advocated behavior would
EMPLOYING INTERPERSONAL INFLUENCE
include those who adopted the practice prior to the intervention plus those who had been convinced during the time
that the intervention was implemented. Denoting the number of persons having adopted the advocated health practice
postintervention as A1 ,
A1 = f (those who have adopted preexperiment, number of
markedly) k, M k , is substituted, then the estimate of A1 that
emerges remains reasonably accurate. This estimate of k also
presumes that there is no overlap in the contacts for each
I.2
Let ϕ denote the proportion of those k contacts that each
I convinces. Then, if X is the number of persons each I
convinces,
superdiffusers, number influenced during the
Xi = ϕk = ϕλP , where 0