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A surprising new way to discourage risky behaviors
http://www.world-science.net/othernews/080825_outgroup

Aug. 25, 2008
Courtesy University of Chicago Press Journals
and World Science staff

Ad cam­paigns aimed at re­duc­ing un­healthy be­hav­iors like binge drink­ing of­ten fo­cus on the health risks.

But new re­search sug­gests a sur­pris­ing new tac­tic ex­ploit­ing so­cial psy­chol­o­gy might work bet­ter. The trick: link a risky be­hav­ior with some oth­er group of peo­ple that the tar­geted au­di­ence would­n’t want to be con­fused with.



Researchers have long cast about for new and better ways to re­duce un­healthy be­hav­iors like binge drink­ing. (Image: U.S. CDC)


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Such a cam­paign, in oth­er words, would “at­tend to how be­hav­iors act as mark­ers or sig­nals of ident­ity,” wrote the sci­en­tists, Jo­nah Berger of the Uni­ver­s­ity of Penn­syl­va­nia and Lind­say Rand of Stan­ford Uni­ver­s­ity in Cal­i­for­nia, in the newly pub­lished find­ings.

The pair organized their own ex­pe­ri­men­tal pub­licity cam­paigns. These were aimed at col­lege stu­dents—but with an eye to­ward anoth­er group whom these par­ti­ci­pants had noth­ing against, but would­n’t want to be con­fused.

Groups of peo­ple seen as some­how sep­a­ra­te by anoth­er are known as “out­groups” in so­cial psy­chol­o­gy jar­gon. The “in­group” of­ten sees out­groups as in­fe­ri­or, but not always.

Berger and Rand con­ducted two in­i­tial stud­ies based on a pre­sump­tion that col­lege stu­dents would con­sid­er “grad­u­a­te stu­dents” an out­group.

In one stu­dy, col­lege stu­dents were led to be­lieve that grad­u­a­te stu­dents con­sumed more junk food. Stu­dents ex­posed to this mes­sage chose 28 per­cent few­er junk-food items than par­ti­ci­pants who thought their group ate more junk food, the re­search­ers re­ported.

In anoth­er stu­dy, re­search­ers put fli­ers in fresh­man col­lege dor­mi­to­ries. In one dorm, the fli­ers em­pha­sized the health risks of binge drink­ing. In anoth­er dorm, the fli­ers linked binge drink­ing to grad­u­a­te stu­dents. Par­ti­ci­pants in the dorm with the sec­ond fli­er drank at least 50 per­cent less al­co­hol than those who saw the health risk fli­ers, the in­ves­ti­ga­tors found.

In a third stu­dy, stu­dents on their way to a cam­pus ea­tery were sur­veyed about per­cep­tions of the me­dia. One group read an ar­ti­cle about pol­i­tics and pop cul­ture. A sec­ond group read an ar­ti­cle as­so­ci­at­in junk-food eat­ing with on­line gamers. When re­search as­sis­tants watched the two groups or­der­ing food, they found that the group who had read the ar­ti­cle about on­line gamers made health­i­er choices.

“De­ci­sions are not only based on risks and ben­e­fits, but al­so the ident­ity that a giv­en choice com­mu­ni­cates to oth­ers,” Berger and Rand wrote. Thus “shift­ing per­cep­tions of the ident­ity associa­ted with a risky be­hav­ior can help make bet­ter health a real­ity.” The find­ings are pub­lished in the Jour­nal of Con­sum­er Re­search.

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