The study of attitudes and their influence has been longstanding in psychology. Over time, scientific interest has shifted from understanding the Nazi propaganda machine during WWII to much more mundane concerns (e.g., convincing people to engage in healthy eating practices). Most contemporary research in the field centers around changing moderate people with moderate messages to a moderate degree. Largely absent from the existing literature is research on how to influence people who have difficult-to-change, strong attitudes (i.e., attitudes that are extreme, held with certainty, and/or are connected to group-identity). With the global rise in extremism and extremist behavior, and increasing polarization, there’s a pressing need to address this gap. A project team led by Richard E. Petty at Ohio State University plans to do so with three research aims:

1. How to influence people who hold strong attitudes (e.g., using two-sided rather than the more typical one-sided messages);
2. How attitudes and their strength relate to the prediction of extreme actions such as engaging in or supporting violence to foster one’s ideas; 
3. When and why people fall prey to extreme ideas, including conspiracy theories.

For research aim 1, the team plans to explore the possible mechanisms of behavior change including being understood, increasing self esteem, and assessing intellectual humility. They’ll also explore situational moderators and examine new techniques to change beliefs/behaviors. An exploration of ambivalence, group identity, and potential interactions among measured attitude strength, as well as the effects of manipulation of attitude strength features, will be the focus of aim 2. For aim 3, the team will investigate the impact of extreme counter-attitudinal messages and extreme pro-attitudinal messages. They will also examine potential moderators of the effectiveness of extreme messages other than attitude strength.

The team hopes findings from this project lead to interventions that may help the most closed-minded people become more open-minded.