PM per: the 3185 EU) TBS mai Sig Of an: ABSTRACT A METRIC MULTIDIMENSIONAL EXAMINATION OF SOCIAL JUDGMENT PREDICTIONS OF ASSIMILATION, CONTRAST, AND ATTITUDE CHANGE By John Thomas Marlier Previous studies have supported the social judgment proposition that receiver perceptions of, and responses to, persuasive messages are functions of the discrepancy between the receiver's attitude and the attitude expressed by the message, the receiver's involvement with the topic, and message structure. Scaling procedures employed in these studies have, however, lacked precision. These studies utilize a multidimensional, ratio level, response centered attitude scale to map the stimulus do- mains of individuals. Results do not conform to social judgment predictions. Significant amounts of variance in perceptual displacement of messages are explained by a linear function of discrep- ancy with small positive lepe and small negative inter- cept. Magnitudes of attitude change are found to be primarily a positive linear function of change advocated. Sixty-three percent of the variance in signed values of attitude change is explained by a polynomial function in- cluding discrepancy, message structure, exponential func- tions of these variables, and involvement as predictors. A METRIC MULTIDIMENSIONAL EXAMINATION OF SOCIAL JUDGMENT PREDICTIONS OF ASSIMILATION, CONTRAST, AND ATTITUDE CHANGE By John Thomas Marlier A DISSERTATION Submitted to Michigan State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Department of Communication 1976 Copyright by JOHN THOMAS MARLIER © 1976 DEDICATION To the memory of my friend, John M. Cruikshank. ii 139' th vi wi gc ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Research is not a solitary activity. Many hundreds of people have contributed time and energy to this project over the past three years. I would like to thank them all indi- vidually, but since that is impossible I must content myself with singling out a few whose support and encouragement have gone beyond the call of duty, friendship, and, in some cases, devotion. My thanks go first of all to my advisor, Dr. Joseph Woelfel, without whom this project could not have been at- tempted even if I had thought of it, which I would not have if he had not stimulated my thinking in so many ways. Special thanks also go to the other members of my guidance committee: Dr. Erwin Bettinghaus, Dr. Donald Cushman, Dr. Gerald Miller, and Dr. James Phillips. Dr. Bettinghaus has not only provided perspicacious academic advice, but has also been particularly helpful with the writing and, as Department Chairman, with arranging the myriad logistical details and material support necessary to complete the pro- ject. Dr. Cushman and Dr. Miller have provided support and encouragement in more ways than I can name ever since the original draft proposal for Study I was presented as a paper for a course they co-taught three years ago. Dr. Phillips iii h: has astounded me with his diligence as a committee member from another academic department, and with his rigorous, insightful questions and advice. Mike Cody has been a friend, colleague, and co-author who has stimulated my thinking in many ways. Many of the ideas presented here have been developed, honed and refined while Mike and I shared what someone once called "the salu- tory intellectual effects of wine and cheese." I thank Mike for those enjoyable and stimulating times, for help with data collection, and also for "discovering" Richard Holmes. Without Richard Holmes, computer shaman, and the per- formance of his daily miracles, this project could easily have required three or four thousand years to complete. Mere mortal thanks are therefore inadequate to express my appre- ciation to him. So I will instead follow the example Mike Cody set in his M.A. Thesis, and note here that "Rick helped too." Kathy Sherry is the kind of friend who, when time is tight and nerves are frayed, is prone to ask if she can help somehow, like maybe by typing Tables, Appendices, and things like that. A friend in need is a friend who cannot be ad- equately thanked, but I offer my affectionate, though inad- equate, thanks here anyway. My thanks go, too, to Ruth Langenbacher for typing the final copy, arranging binding, and taking care of all the administrative matters involved in writing a dissertation iv which she does so well and I do so poorly. Last, but at least ten thousand Galileos from least, my loving thanks are offered to my wife Ada. I could, I suppose, mention that she helped with data collection, spent months coding data from the first study, typed drafts far into many nights, bore "computer widowhood" with amazing patience, etc., etc. To do so, however, would fall far short of acknowledging my debt to her. She has challenged me to become who I am, has shared my yoke as well as my bed, and has stayed in harness with me when the Mandolin Wind reached hurricane strength. I love her, which is as close as I can come to expressing what she means to me in words. TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page I CONCEPTUAL DISCUSSION AND RATIONALE ......... 1 Introduction ................................ 1 Social Judgment Conception of Attitude, Involvement, and Message Structure ...... 4 Operational Approaches to Attitude, Involvement, and Message Structure ...... 7 Alternative Operational Approach to Social Judgment Variables ..... . ................ 16 Conclusion .................................. 35 II METHODS, STUDY I ............................ 36 Introduction ................................ 36 Procedures .................................. 39 (a) Topic Selection ..................... 39 (b) Subject Selection ................... 40 (c) Q-Sort and Referent Selection ....... 41 (d) Pretest Questionnaire ............... 43 (e) Message Construction ................ 45 (f) Postest Questionnaire ............... 46 (g) Experimental Procedure .............. 46 III RESULTS, STUDY I ............................ 48 Attrition and Randomization Check ........... 48 Stability Estimation .................. . ..... 48 Operationalization of Predictors ............ 51 Regression Analyses ......................... 55 (a) Displacement Magnitude as Criterion. 55 (b) Signed Values of Displacement as Criterion ...................... 57 Conclusion .................................. 59 IV METHODS, STUDY II ........................... 64 Introduction ................................ 64 Stability Check Pretest ..................... 65 (a) Questionnaire Construction .......... 65 (b) Subject Selection ................... 65 (c) Experimental Procedure .............. 65 (d) Results of Stability Check Pretest.. 65 vi Procedures .................................. (a) Questionnaire Construction .......... (b) Pretest Questionnaires .............. (c) Postest Questionnaires .............. (d) Subject Selection ................... (e) Experimental Procedures ............. V RESULTS, STUDY II ........................... Participation and Randomization Check ....... Operationalization of Predictors ............ Regression Analyses ......................... (a) Displacement Magnitude as Criterion. (b) Signed Values of Displacement as Criterion ......................... (c) Magnitude of Attitude Change as Criterion ......................... (d) Signed Values of Attitude Change as Criterion ...................... Correlational Validation of Involvement ..... VI DISCUSSION .................................. Introduction ................................ Theoretic Findings .......................... Methodological Findings ..................... Directions for Future Research .............. Appendix A - Topic Selection Questionnaire .......... Appendix B - Q-Sort Statements with Means and Variances of Q-Sort Placement .......... Appendix C - Pretest Questionnaire from Study I ..... Appendix D - Experimental Messages with Values of Message Structure ...................... Appendix B - Postest Questionnaire from Study I with Message 1 ......................... Appendix F - Description of Initial Involvement Operationalization ..................... Appendix G - Summary of Linear and Logarithmic Regression Analyses from Study I ....... Appendix H - Questionnaire from Stability Check Pretest, Study II ...................... vii 66 66 68 68 69 7O 71 71 71 73 73 76 79 82 82 86 86 86 9O 91 94 99 109 120 123 136 137 142 Appendix I - Pretest Questionnaire from Study 11.... 151 Appendix J - Postest Questionnaire from Study II with Message 1 ......................... 156 Appendix K - Table A1 - Summary Table for Regression with Attitude Change Magnitudes Controlled for Effects of Testing as Criterion .............................. 162 Appendix L - Table A2 - Summary Table for Regression with Signed Values of Attitude Change Controlled for Effects of Testing as Criterion .............................. 163 LIST OF REFERENCES .................................. . 164 viii LIST OF TABLES Table Page 1 Concept Numbers of Scaled Referent State- ments, with Means and Variances of Q-Sort Placements ................................. 44 2 Coordinates of Concepts in Total Aggregate (Criterion) Space .................. . ....... 50 3 Correlations of Stable Concept Vectors in the Total Aggregate Space with Corresponding Vectors in Study I Treatment Group Spaces, with Z Conversions ......................... 52 4 Summary Table for Regression with Displace- ment Magnitude as Criterion, Study I ....... 56 5 Regression Coefficients for Predictors of Displacement Magnitudes, Study I ........... 58 6 Summary Table for Regression with Signed Values of Displacement as Criterion, Study I 60 7 Regression Coefficients for Predictors of Signed Values of Displacement, Study I ..... 61 8 Correlations Between Stable Concept Vectors in the Total Aggregate Space of Study I and Corresponding Vectors in the Stability Check Pretest Space of Study II, with E Conversions ................................ 67 9 Summary Table for Regression with Displace- ment Magnitude as Criterion, Study II ...... 75 10 Summary Table for Regression with Signed Values of Displacement as Criterion, Study II ................................... 78 11 Summary Table for Regression with Attitude Change Magnitude as Criterion, Study 11.... 80 12 Regression Coefficients for Predictors of Attitude Change Magnitudes, Study II ....... 81 ix Table 13 14 A1 AZ Page Summary Table for Regression with Signed Values of Attitude Change as Criterion, Study 11 ................................... 83 Regression Coefficients for Predictors of Signed Values of Attitude Change, Study II. 84 Summary Table for Regression with Attitude Change Magnitudes Controlled for Effects of Testing as Criterion ....................... 162 Summary Table for Regression with Signed Values of Attitude Change Controlled for Effects of Testing as Criterion ............ 163 LIST OF FIGURES Experimental Design ........................ 39 Graphic Sketch of Predicted Values of Dis- placement as a Function of Discrepancy, Study I .......................... . ......... 62 xi Table 13 14 A1 A2 Summary Table for Regression with Signed Values of Attitude Change as Criterion, Study II ................................... 83 Regression Coefficients for Predictors of Signed Values of Attitude Change, Study II. 84 Summary Table for Regression with Attitude Change Magnitudes Controlled for Effects of Testing as Criterion ....................... 162 Summary Table for Regression with Signed Values of Attitude Change Controlled for Effects of Testing as Criterion ............ 163 CHAPTER I CONCEPTUAL DISCUSSION AND RATIONAL INTRODUCTION The basic information for predicting a person's reaction to a communication is where he places its position and the communicator relative to himself. The way that a person appraises a communication and perceives its position relative to his own stand affects his reaction to it and what he will do as a result (Sherif and Sherif, 1967, p. 129). Social judgment theory attempts to make predictions about receivers' placements of communication relative to themselves on the basis of the receivers' attitudes toward the topic of the message and the attitude toward that topic actually expressed in the message. In general, social judg- ment theory predicts that messages expressing attitudes at distance x from the receiver's own attitude toward the topic will be either assimilated toward the attitudes of the re- ceiver, or contrasted to the attitude of the receiver, de- pending upon the size of distance x. Messages normatively perceived as expressing attitudes relatively near to a receiver's attitude on the tOpic will be perceived by the receiver as expressing attitudes even nearer to the receiver's attitudes. Messages normatively perceived as expressing atti- tudes far removed from receiver attitudes will be perceived l 2 by the receiver as expressing attitudes even further removed. Distances between the receiver's attitude on an issue and other possible attitudes on that issue are divided into three latitudes: latitude of acceptance, latitude of noncommitment, and latitude of rejection. Falling within the latitude of acceptance are all attitudes toward an issue which the receiver considers to be near enough to his own to be acceptable to him. The latitude of rejection contains all those attitudes so distant from his own that he would reject them as being incompatible with his own position. Attitudes in the lati- tude of noncommitment are not acceptable to the receiver, but are also not so distant from his own attitudes as to require outright rejection. The apogee of the assimilation-contrast curve is assumed to lie somewhere near the boundary of the latitudes of noncommitment and rejection. Results of studies conducted to date generally lend support to this curvilinear relationship between mispercep- tions of attitudes expressed in messages and prior attitudes of the receivers of those messages. (Sherif and Hovland, 1961; Hovland, Harvey and Sherif, 1957; Sherif, Sherif, and Nebergal, 1965). Desirable precision, however, has been lacking for two reasons. The first of these reasons is the failure of many studies to control for one or more of the variables which have been shown to mediate the process of assimilation and contrast. These potent mediating variables are ego- 3 involvement in the issue, degree of structure of the message, and the credibility of the source. Of these three, the first two are inherently present in any experiment attempt- ing to specify the relationship between prior receiver atti- tudes and perceptual displacement of attitudes expressed in a message. Accordingly, ego-involvement and message struc- ture, insofar as they affect the processes of assimilation and contrast, must be dealt with in this discussion. Source credibility, however, will be excluded from this discussion, since it is easily removed as a confounding variable in any experimental manipulation of assimilation and contrast effects, and is therefore to be considered external to the central relationship under consideration. The second reason that empirical tests of the relation- ship between prior attitudes and message perception have yielded only imprecise results is that the measurement tech-- niques employed in these studies have themselves been impre- cise. An adequate discussion and reformulation of the theo- retical relationship must therefore include suggestions for the deve10pment of methodology adequate to test that relation- ship. In light of the above considerations, the rationale for the present study includes: 1. a discussion of the conceptions of attitude, ego- involvement, and message structure under a social judgment model, 4 2. a discussion of the Operationalization of these three variables in past research dealing with con- trast and assimilation, and 3. suggestions for development of measuring instru- ments and analysis procedures capable of subjecting the posited relationship to rigorous empirical test. SOCIAL JUDGMENT CONCEPTION OF ATTITUDE, INVOLVEMENT, AND MESSAGE STRUCTURE In their explication of the social judgment conception of attitude, Sherif and Sherif (1967) define attitude as: The individual's set of categories for evaluating a stimulus domain, which he has established as he learns about that domain in interaction with other persons and which relate him to various subsets within the domain with varying degrees of positive or negative effect (p. 115). Several characteristics of attitudes are discussed in this article, which the authors argue are implicit in this def- inition. First, attitude formation is dependent on learning, rather than innate to the individual. This, in turn, im- plies that attitudes always imply relationships between the person and the object of his attitude, based upon his learned perceptions of himself and the object relative to other identifiable referents in a given stimulus domain. These other referents, implicitly, are themselves not spatio- temporally bound, and therefore are stable in their relation- ship to each other. They are perhaps viewed most accurately as abstract alternative possible attitudes. Third, attitudes are 51‘ pe tu en be h( 5 are considered to be fairly resistant to abrupt change, since they are formed relative to a more or less extensive period of association with those referents. Fourth, atti- tudes toward objects are the result of categorical differ- entiation between objects in a stimulus domain, as well as between the subject himself and the objects toward which he holds those attitudes. And finally, the relationship be- tween a person and an object is not considered to be neutral, but rather to have motivational-affective properties. The structure of an individual's attitude, relative to other referents and his relationship to those referents, may be inferred from consistently selective modes of behavior relative to those concepts. Underlying these behavioral patterns is assumed to be a judgment process involving com- parison and evaluation of objects which the individual has categorized as either objectionable or acceptable to him, i.e., conceptually distant or near to him. Those objects or referents relatively near to him fall within his latitude of acceptance, those far from him into his latitude of rejec- tion. Any referents between these latitudes lie in a lati- tude of noncommitment. The individual's own attitudes are considered to be an anchor, or base point, at or near the center of his latitude of acceptance. The resistance to change of that attitude, or strength of the anchoring effect, is a function of the individual's involvement with the issue. 6 Involvement with an issue, or salience of the topic of a message to the individual, is conceptualized as the degree to which an individual's own position in the stimulus domain involving that issue is important to him. It is assumed that an individual who considers his own position to be high- ly important will be less inclined to consider relatively distant stimuli acceptable, and more inclined to consider relatively near stimuli objectionable. Involvement may, therefore, be inferred from the relative sizes of an individ- ual's latitudes of acceptance and rejection. Highly involved subjects tend to have narrower latitudes of acceptance and broader latitudes of rejection than less involved subjects. Considering the earlier statement of the curvilinear relation- ship between subject attitude and message placement, with an apogee at the non-commitment-rejection boundary, we may then conclude that "the range of assimilation is inversely related to the degree of personal involvement" (Sherif and Sherif, 1967, p. 131). The structure of communication is also related to the placement of communication. Conceptually, the degree to which a message is structured is defined in terms of the number of alternative placements which the message itself allows. Thus, an unstructured, or ambiguous, message is highly susceptible to assimilation and contrast, while a highly structured message is susceptible to a more limited range of displacements by receivers. As a general 7 formulation, "the range of assimilation increases as the structure of communication deceases" (Sherif and Sherif, 1967, p. 132). OPERATIONAL APPROACHES TO ATTITUDE, INVOLVEMENT, AND MESSAGE STRUCTURE As noted earlier, one of the major reasons for lack of precision in the testing of social judgment predictions about assimilation and contrast has been imprecise measurement. In the main, researchers have employed two types of measurements of attitude, both of which are ordinal in nature. Several studies (see e.g. Hovland, Harvey and Sherif, 1957; Sherif, Sherif and Nebergall, 1965) have attempted to measure attitudes of subjects on an issue and their latitudes of acceptance and rejection through a method of ordered al- ternatives. This method involves: 1. content analysis of the total range of statements made publicly by peOple expressing attitudes toward that issue, 2. selection of nine of these statements represent- ative of attitudes actually expressed and assumed to ordinally represent the entire range of attitudes which subjects might have toward that issue, 3. having subjects indicate the statements which they agree with most, those they find acceptable, and those they find unacceptable, or reject. This procedure defines the subject's own position, his latitude of nu 8 acceptance, and his latitude of rejection. The subject's latitude of noncommitment is then desig- nated as encompassing any statements which the subject neither accepts nor rejects. 4. the subject's perception of the message is then obtained by having him locate the message on the ordered list of alternative attitudes toward the issue. This method of ordered alternatives has several disadvant- ages as a method of measurement of attitudes, as they are conceived by the theory. The first of these disadvantages is the imposition of a category structure on the subjects. As noted earlier, social judgment theory conceives of attitudes as reflecting learned relationships between subject, object and other identifiable referents in the stimulus domain. This implies, however, that referents may differ for each individual. It is true that selection of categories from public statements about an issue makes it likely that those statements will be meaningful as referents in the stimulus domain of any individual. But such an argument only justifies such cate- gory imposition as a crude approximation of subjects' actual referents for the attitudes expressed. The subject's individual attitude, or position relative to referents (abstract alternative possible attitudes) which are common to all individuals, may be affected by other referents 9 peculiar to his experience and conceptual structure. This observation leads to a second objection to the ordered al- ternative method. The second related problem with the method of ordered alternatives is the untested assumption of unidimensionality, or ordinality, of the categories as selected. This assump- tion is, in effect, that the stimulus domain is identical for, and all referents are related uniformly to, each of the ordered alternatives and the subject. Distinctions between alternatives, and between each of the alternatives and the subject, may then be made along a single line in conceptual space. This is a rather large assumption, particularly when one considers the actual lists of ordered alternatives used in some studies. For example, Hovland, g£_§l. (1957), in their study of prohibition in Oklahoma, employed a list of ordered alternative statements expressing attitudes toward the sale and use of alcohol. Some of these statements argue for prohibition on the basis that alcohol is a major cause of corruption in public life; others on the basis of the difficulty of self-disciplined moderation; and one mentions the medicinal value of alcohol for snake bites. On the other end of the scale, one statement argues for legaliza- tion of alcohol as a source of tax revenue to improve schools. The point here is that introduction of such dis- parate topical references in different attitudinal referents may crowd the stimulus domain of subjects with referents 10 related to snakes, schools, and corrupt public officials, thereby confusing the comparative and evaluative procedure of judgment. This may lead to two different types of error, depending upon whether or not the additional operative re- ferents are common to all subjects, or unique to particular individuals. If the additional operative referents are common, then the normatively perceived position of the ab- stract referent alternative, as viewed by the aggregate sub- ject population, may not be on a line with the other referents. The assumption of ordinal, intransitive, unidimensional rela- tions among the ordered alternatives may therefore be un- justified. The second case, where alternative operative referent(s) are unique to the individual, might result in the position of that individual in the stimulus domain being somewhere other than on a line with the presented alternative. This problem, like the first, would be essentially the result of an invalid assumption of unidimensional transitivity of the scales employed. Finally, there is the problem of the unknown relative distances between categories represented by the ordered al- ternatives. Sherif and Sherif (1967, p. 116) state that no assumptions are made about the size of these intervals when this procedure is employed, thereby admitting that the pro- cedure suffers from the lack of precision inherent in ordinal scaling techniques. But it has been argued that the submission of frequency counts, and of size estimates of n3 11 latitudes of acceptance and rejection based on categories, to subsequent parametric analysis implies an operative as- sumption of equal intervals between categories, despite the Sherifs' disclaimer (McLaughlin and Sharman, 1972). In either case, precise quantification of relations between referents in the stimulus domain is not possible when atti- tudes are inferred from subject responses to linearly ordered alternatives. A second method which has been employed to determine latitudes of acceptance, rejection, and subjects' own atti- tudes is the "own categories procedure." Essentially, this procedure is a derivative of Thurstone's Q-sort technique, with the difference that it allows the individual to use as many or as few categories as seem natural to him. This pro- cedure has the advantage of not imposing a category system on the subject. With that exception, however, it shares all of the disadvantages discussed above as related to the method of ordered alternatives. In addition, it has the disadvant- age of non-comparability of data, due to unequal numbers of categories across subjects. A third method of assessing attitudes is the semantic differential technique employed by Diab (1965). In this procedure, subjects are asked to evaluate a topic (e.g. "Arab Unity") on seven point semantic differential scales intended to tap the evaluation, potency, and activity dimen- sions recommended by Osgood, Suci, and Tannenbaum (1957). 12 Alternative attitudes are therefore not imposed on subjects. It is questionable, however, that the stimulus is unambigu- ously perceived across 55, and entirely possible that the 85 are in fact responding to stimuli which are perceived to dif- fer along dimensions other than those utilized to measure their meaning. In avoiding the assumption of unidimension- ality, Diab instead imposes a three-dimensional predefined stimulus domain on his subjects. Further, the imposition of the model requires adoption of such assumptions of factor analysis as intervality, standard attribute (dimension) length, a meaningful centroid, and exhaustiveness of the set of attributes from which the presented scales have been selected. Theoretical arguments and empirical evidence have been presented elsewhere (Cody, Marlier and Woelfel, 1975) questioning these assumptions. In sum, it has been argued here that procedures which have been employed to assess attitudes in social judgment research have lacked precision and/or have failed to meet the requirements of the theoretic conception of attitude for several reasons: 1. failure to allow for individual differences in stimulus domains, 2. the most common procedure, the ordered alterna- tives method, superimposes judgmental categories on subjects, 3. all methods discussed make assumptions 13 of dimensionality and/or transitivity which they do not test, and 4. the intervals between categories are either un- known or assumed in all methods. Methods of operationalizing involvement in an issue have largely depended upon the Operationalization of atti- tude and determination of sizes of latitudes of acceptance and rejection. Involvement has been inferred from the rela- tive size of (or numbers of items included in) latitudes of rejection, noncommitment, and acceptance when either the own categories or ordered alternative procedures have been utilized. (See e.g. Sherif g£_al., 1965; Sereno, 1968; Sereno and Mortensen, 1969; Mortensen and Sereno, 1970; Sereno and Bodaken, 1972). Results support the conclusion that highly involved subjects are less prone to assimilate communication toward their own views than are less involved subjects. Such results cannot be conclusive, however, as long as they depend ultimately on measurement of attitude and assessment of latitudes of acceptance and rejection as impre- cise as those which have been used. Furthermore, Diab's (1965a) finding of variations in the relative sizes of lati- tudes of acceptance and rejection depending on the affective direction of 85' involvement suggests the possibility of systematic artifacts resulting from interactions between the content of particular messages and the attitude of the re- ceiver confounding this Operationalization. 14 Diab (1965a) operationalized involvement through a var- iation of the ordered alternatives procedure. Having given 85 a series of statements assumed to represent continua of alternative referents along evaluation and "possibility" dimensions, he asked them to indicate both the one they agreed with most and the strength of their feelings of agree- ment (very strong, strong, or mild). While this procedure circumvents the possible interactions between attitudinal valence and latitude size, it does so at the cost of possible response bias and without increasing precision of scaling above the ordinal level. In a later article, Diab (1967) suggests a procedure for operationalizing involvement by having 55 mark most accept- able, acceptable, and unacceptable spaces on this sematic differential scales utilized to measure the meanings of topics, and then using the sizes of the latitudes determined in the way to estimate involvement levels. Sereno (1969) sees great advantage in this technique, particularly in terms of ease of administration and standardization of pre and post tests which is impossible with the own categories procedure. Even if acceptance or rejection of semantic differential spaces can be considered equivalent to acceptance or rejection of attitudinal statements in the ordered alternatives or own categories procedures, however, the troublesome valence- latitude size interaction (Diab, 1965a) reappears when in- volvement is operationalized in this way. Further, evidence is {e ti 1: 15 is available that acceptance or rejection of semantic dif- ferential spaces is not equivalent to acceptance or rejec- tion of attitudinal statements. Wilmot (1971a, b) has found low correlations between involvement scores obtained using these various procedures, and concluded that the "different operational definitions measure diverse variables" (1971b). It is important to note, too, that this conclusion stimulates additional doubt about the efficacy of semantic differential measures of attitude. Finally, the Operationalization of degree of message structure has been achieved through adjustments of messages to either draw conclusions implicitly or explicitly (e.g. Hovland and Mandell, 1952). While this method has indicated the potential importance of degree of structure as a mediat- ing variable, supporting the theoretic proposition that highly structured messages are less susceptible to assimila- tion and contrast than less structured messages, it has not allowed researchers to predict the effects of uncontrolled structural properties in given messages. In short, revision of social judgment methodology should either provide a way to control all salient aspects of message structure (an un- realistic goal), or provide some measure of the degree to which subjects perceive a message as being structured (which is feasible). This section of the paper has dealt with operations employed in social judgment research and the problems asso alte of c ALTE VAR} ment attj sibi dom: dit: suc] prOj suc' fat Whe tiv As she alt tic abi Dre inv 16 associated with those operations. The next section proposes alternative methodology applicable to this research, capable of circumventing the problems discussed above. ALTERNATIVE OPERATIONAL APPROACH TO SOCIAL JUDGMENT VARIABLES The methodology proposed here for test of social judg- ment predictions about message placement (and, ultimately, attitude change) begins with the content analytic selection of ordered alternatives representing as wide a range as pos- sible of abstract yet identifiable positions in the stimulus domain of any individual relative to the given issue. Tra- ditionally, social judgment researchers have selected nine such alternative position statements. Under the procedure proposed here, precision would be increased as the number of such statements increased, up to a point at which subject fatigue would begin to contribute to unreliability. Any- where from nine to fifteen would be acceptable. Step two is the presentation of these ordered alterna- tives in all possible pairs for comparison with each other. As discussed by Sherif and Hovland (1961), this technique shows great potential for increasing reliability of ordered alternative measures. Sherif and Sherif (1967, p. 128) men- tion an unpublished study by Koslin in which repreated reli- ability ratings 3 .95 were obtained by the paired comparison presentation of categorical ordered alternatives on a highly involving issue. 17 In our procedure a more complex judgment (i.e., a quantified estimate of distances between pairs, relative to a standard distance represented by the distance between the first pair presented) will be required of subjects. This additional judgmental complexity can be expected to reduce measurement reliability. The reduction due to increased judgmental complexity, however, should be counterbalanced by an increase in reliability due to analytic procedures which allow deviations from unidimensionality to be attributed to something other than error variance. Furthermore, the in- crease in judgmental complexity should not be great, since subjects are conceived of as residents of a stimulus domain containing referents which they view in terms of their inter- relationships, i.e., relative distances from each other. This procedure merely asks for estimates of the relative sizes of these distances within a stimulus domain, in terms of each other. No outside standards of distance are imposed. It may be argued, of course, that analyses of conceptual spatial relationships in which individuals are the units of analysis are highly unstable. This argument does not hold against this procedure, however, because the conceptual stim- ulus domains of all individuals involved contain, in common, abstract alternative referents. The theoretic conception of a stimulus domain considers these referents to have fixed positions, relative to each other, which are stable over time since the referents are not spatio-temporally bound, 18 i.e. are not associated with particular individuals or times. They are, rather, alternative possible positions which might be held by any individual at any point in time. Individual differences in perceptions of the relationships between these referents must therefore be viewed as resulting from differ- ing perspectives of individuals located at different points in space relative to those referents. More will be said about this in the section on data analysis. For now, suffice it to note that the stabilizing effect of abstract referents whose relationship to each other is fixed in the stimulus domains of all subjects, should resolve the potential problem of instability of individual units of analysis. The feasibil- ity of such judgments is therefore entirely consistent with the social judgment conception of attitude discussed earlier. The paired comparison method also holds a conceptual ad- vantage over traditional ordered alternative presentations in two other ways: (1) by not bounding the subject within pre- sumed outer limits of attitudinal referents, paired compari- sons allow accurate representation of the relative position of subjects whose own positions may be more extreme than the end point of the ordered alternative scale, and (2) paired comparison allows a check on the transitivity of the presumed ordinal scale. Message presentation under this procedure is identical to message presentation in prior social judgment research. It is suggested, at least initially, until the viability 19 of these procedures has been established, that parsimonious investigation requires rigorous control of the confounding variable of source credibility. Post-test procedures repeat the pre-test procedures, with the exception that post-test questionnaires must include the attitude expressed in the message as one of the referents in the paired comparison procedure. The primary distinction between procedures proposed here and traditional social judgment procedures lies in the analy- sis of the data. For reasons cited earlier, which follow the line of reasoning laid out by McLaughlin and Sharman (1972), a joint subject-concept space will be mathematically generated from the data, which corresponds to the social judgment con- ception of a'stimulus domain. The immediate and most obvious advantage this system provides is a check on the dimensional- ity of the stimulus domain, i.e., on the assumption of un- dimensionality implicit in the ordinal scaling techniques employed previously. Mathematical generation of such a space allows the stimulus domain to assume any number of dimensions, rather than forcing its referents into the closest approxima- tion of a one dimensional fit. It is important to note, how- ever, that the mathematical procedure involved in generating such a space does not force dimensionality on the interrela- tionships of a set of constructs. If the implicit scaling assumptions of ordinality hold, the space generated will be unidimensional. If not, the researcher not only knows the 20 dimensionality of the space (stimulus domain) involved, but can analyze his data regardless of it. In McLaughlin and Sharman's (1972) study these assumptions were faulty enough to result in the generation of a two dimensional space, but analysis was not stymied by that fact. This is an important advantage of multi-dimensional procedures such as the one proposed here. An important distinction between McLaughlin's method and the one proposed lies in the distinction between metric and non-metric scaling techniques. McLaughlin's non-metric multi- dimensional procedure controls some of the problems of unidi- mensionality and transitivity, but does not allow for determ- ination of interval size. The quantification of paired comparisons under our procedure does allow for this determ- ination, and thus for increased precision in defining the conceptual stimulus domain. Several other characteristics of such a space should be noted here. First, if subjects are selected randomly, and distribu- ted randomly with regard to their own positions in the space, extremely accurate positioning of the "real," or aggregate mean, location of the referents is possible. This point is perhaps best illustrated by means of a diagram (Fig. l) which, for illustrative clarity, represents the case of a two dimensional space. 21 l 2 3 4 5 Where: A, B, C, D, are Tiozc. ,4/77\ referents;1, 2, \ ‘\“:‘-‘ ,/.”/' / \ 3, 4, 5 are sub- ‘\ X \,\/\\< / \ jects;i,j,k, l \ 2 j >< y7\ \ are perpendiculars k 1 ~../ C______=fi represent1ng per- 1 ceived 1nterp01nt distances FIGURE 1 Theoretically, since referents A, B, C, and D, are alterna- tive possible positions in the stimulus domain which are abstract in nature, their positions related to each other are fixed, and not subject to change over time as the posi- tions of individuals (attitudes) are. Consequently, it is consistent with the social judgment conception of attitude to view differences in individuals' judgments of these dis- tances as resulting from differences in the positions of those individuals, i.e., their perspectives in viewing the referents. For example, in Fig. 1, subject 1 will perceive the distance between referents C and D as being the length of perpendicular k. Similarly, subject 5 will perceive distance AB as the length of perpendicular j, and distance CD as the length of l. The distances which individuals per- ceive between messages, then, are a function of the individuals position in the space relative to those re- ferents. In this example, subject 1 will perceive distance AB as larger than will subject 5. Conversely, subject 5 22 will perceive distance CD to be larger than will subject 1, since the angle C5D is larger than the angle C1D. Thus no individual subject will accurately perceive the "real” fixed interpoint distances between all abstract referents. The mean of all estimates of these distances made by a large number of subjects whose positions are randomly dis- tributed in space, however, will be an accurate figure, since variations due to all perspectives are approximated by this procedure. Thus, this procedure circumvents the lack of precision which has resulted from arbitrary a priori placement of referent alternatives at assumed equal intervals along a single dimension in a stimulus domain. This procedure also allows for the effects of different referents being present in an individual's stimulus domain (i.e., snake bites, corrupt public officials, or attitudes toward public education) without altering his final position relative to the "real" position of the presented referents. In other words, it allows for individual differences in the referent content of subjects' stimulus domains. Furthermore, it circumvents the problem of forcing subjects into categor- ies which have been specified by the experimenter, without the necessity of presenting every referent which might also reside in an individual's stimulus domain. For example, in Figure 2, consider A, B, C to be presented referents, with distance AB equal to distance BC, as determined by the aggre- gate. Subject 1 reports that his position in his own 23 R2 R2, A, B, C = Referents l, 2, 3 = Subjects 3 j = i k = l FIGURE 2 stimulus domain is equidistant from A and C,,and the same as B. Subject 2 also perceives his own position in his stim- ulus domain as being equidistant from A and C. His stimulus domain, however, also contains referent R2. The experimenter did not present R2 as a possible alternative position. In- deed, R2 may (or may not) be identifiable only to the par- ticular subject involved. Nevertheless, subject 2 may report his position as being equidistant from A and C, and also some distance (M) from B (closer to R2 than to B) under this pro- cedure. Thus, the effects of differences in referents pre- sent in individual stimulus domains can be accounted for in this system without experimental presentation of every refer- ent any individual could identify in his stimulus domain. The presented referents (A, B, C) must be assumed to be public knowledge, i.e., present and identifiable as a pos- sible position in the stimulus domain of every individual. But this method does not assume that the presented referents represent gygry_possible position in every individual's stim- ulus domain. Implicitly, the more traditional ordered al- ternative methods have made this assumption. In particular, 24 criticisms have been leveled at these more traditional methods because they bound subject positions within the extremes of the presented referents. No forced structur- ing of individual stimulus domains is made with the method proposed here, however, including binding of extreme posi- tions. It is entirely possible for a subject to report dis- tances of himself from referents which locate him beyond the most extreme referent, as subject 3 has done in Figure 2. Location of the message presented, i.e., its "real" position, is also more precise under this system, for reasons similar to those accounting for precision in locating refer- ent alternatives. In prior studies (e.g., Hovland, g£_gl., 1957) a priori judges' ratings of attitudes actually ex- pressed by a message have been utilized. This procedure allows for precise location of the attitude expressed by a message as the grand mean of all positions estimated by a sample distributed randomly in the space. In so doing, it also allows the message to lie somewhere in space other than on the single dimension presumed to contain all of the order- ed alternatives under the older method. For example, in Figure 3, M is the aggregate mean estimate of the position of the message relative to presented referents and subjects. In other words, the position of M in the space represents the attitude which the subject population as a whole per- ceived message M to be expressing on the issue. M M ...Mn 1’ 2 25 1 A, B, C= Referents 4 l, 2. 3, M4= MSubjects ,0 2N5, M4 -Subject's estimate 3 of message placement R= Radius of proximity sphere of A B C estimates of message placement, indicating variance in subject estimates of message location FIGfiU33 represent the positions (attitudes) of M which individual subjects, 1, 2... N perceived message M to be expressing, determined by individuals' estimates of M's distance from themselves and from each of the referents. R represents the radius of a circle (in two dimensional space) about M which encompasses M1, M2"'Mn' As R increases (i.e., as the var- iance in individual subjects' perceptions of message location increases), more space is encompassed by the circle. As more space is encompassed by the circle, more positions in the space may be considered as plausible positions which any one of an infinitely large number of subjects might perceive the message to occupy. In other words, as R increases the number of alternative placements any one subject might perceive a message to have in his stimulus domain increases. Since we have already noted that social judgment theory defines the degree of structure of a message as the inverse of the number of alternative positions a message may be perceived as occupy- ing in a stimulus domain, we may therefore conclude that the quantified determination of R in distance units gives a 26 direct measure of the degree to which any message is struc- tured. Heretofore, this variable has been viewed by social judgment researchers as a highly uncontrollable, though potent, variable. Thus, the two message variables under consideration, attitude expressed by a message and degree of structure of a message, should both be accurately measurable with the procedure proposed here. Involvement, under this system, may be estimated on the basis of the size of latitudes (viewed as regions in the space) of acceptance and rejection. As discussed earlier, the determination of the size of these latitudes is less precise than other operations pr0posed here, although more precise than procedures previously used. For example in Figure 4, the subject could be asked to state which of the presented alternatives he found acceptable, and which he rejected. Under this categorical estimation procedure, the distance between the subject and the farthest acceptable referent from him (R1) would be considered the radius of his latitude of acceptance. His involvement with the issue, or commitment to his own position (degree to which he is anchored) could then be estimated as a function of this radius. The problem with this procedure is that the actual boundary of his latitude of acceptance might fall between referents. The alternative, then, is to ask the subject to estimate the distance from his own position to the farthest position which would be acceptable to him (R2). But this 27 A, B, C, D = Referents l = SUbject E R1 = Categorical estimate of radius of latitude of acceptance R2 = Quantitative estimate of radius of latitude of acceptance. FIGURE 4 judgment might be unreliable if the individual had no refer- ent near that distance from his own position in his stimulus domain against which to gauge his estimate. It is an em- pirical question which of these procedures would yield more useful data. Either of these procedures would yield more precise results than methods previously used, but neither is entirely satisfactory. Therefore, alternative operationali- zations for the involvement variable should be sought. One such alternative will be discussed later, as it is dependent upon the placement of individual subjects in the multidimen- sional space, and therefore is most easily understood as part of the consideration of that variable. Before discussing placement of the individual in the space, however, it is necessary to recognize two assumptions upon which these proposed procedures depend. Both are con- sistent with the social judgment conception of attitude, as discussed earlier; but neither is directly supported by prior empirical evidence. The first is that interpoint distances in a stimulus domain between abstract alternative referents 28 are stable over time for a given population, even though individual perceptions of those distances may change if the individual's position relative to them changes. The second is that individual subjects, as residents of stimulus domains, can reliably and accurately report relative distances be- tween referents in those stimulus domains, as "seen" from their position. The viability of the first assumption depends on the abstractness of referent alternative positions. Content analysis of public statements on issues has been performed in previous studies to select statements expressing attitudes to which all individuals have been exposed. These statements are then presented to subjects without reference to specific times or sources. They do not necessarily represent the position of anyone at any time, then, but rather represent possible positions which might be held by anyone at any time and are identifiable by everyone any time. As such, they are considered to provide constant stabilizing referent points, or landmarks, relative to which the individual may gauge his own position, at any time. The fact that prior studies which have tacitly made this assumption have reported results which support social judgment predictions lends some support to this assumption. Nevertheless, it should be checked in a manner consistent with these procedures in the course of any study employing them. Since referent positions are estimated by an aggregate mean procedure, a way of 29 performing this check is suggested. Aggregate spaces con- taining the referents which have been generated at different points in time, or by different samples drawn from the same population, or both, are rotated to the closest fit mathe- matically. Correlations of the coordinates of referents on the coordinate axes of the space then yield an estimate of the stability of the space. High reliability (stability) is necessary at this aggre- gate level of analysis for the methods prOposed here to ad- equately test social judgment predictions about individual perceptions of messages. The spatial (stimulus domain) di- mensions reported by any individual at different points in time (i.e., before and after hearing a message on the topic) will vary if the individual's position (attitude) in the stimulus domain changes. If the distances which the indi- vidual perceives as having changed are between referents which have themselves remained stable relative to each other, however, we may safely conclude that it is the individual's position (perspective) which has changed, rather than the position of the referents. Thus, demonstrable aggregate stability of presented referents across time allows the re- searcher to utilize their positions as landmarks in com- paring the stimulus domains of a given individual at differ- ing points in time. For example, in Figure 5, Subject 1 would estimate the distance BC to be much smaller than the distance AB. (The normatively perceived, or ”real," 30 1.1L 1 2 A, B, c = Referents \\‘\\¢ 1 = Subject at time 2 f—‘B T T2 FIGURE 5 distances, as determined by the aggregate mean, are known.) At Time 2, however, because his change in position (attitude) has altered his perspective, Subject 1 would provide a much larger (and more "realistic") estimate of the interpoint distance BC, while his estimate of the interpoint distance AB would be smaller. If we did not know the "real” distances AB and BC, or if those distances were known but had changed across time, it would be difficult to determine the relative positions of Subject 1 at Time 1 and Time 2. If, however, the "real" positions of these referents have remained stable relative to each other, then we safely conclude that Subject 1 has changed position. We can locate both the new and the old positions in the same space, using the stable referent points common to his stimulus domains at both points in time. Given the stability of the referent positions over time, then, it should be possible to locate an individual within his stimulus domain, relative to those stable referents which he recognizes in common with other members of his population, at different points in time. His estimates of his own dis- tances from any combination of three referents will locate a 31 point at which he may lie in the space. Taking all possible combinations of referents and his estimated distances from them, then, will result in the definition of a proximity sphere within which the individual must lie. The location of the individual which is most likely, then, will be the center of the sphere, or the grand mean of all of the tri- angulated positions. Such a proximity sphere is represented in Figure 6 as a circle in two dimensional space, of radius R. , B (L D==Refinenfls A , l = Subject mean location 1 = SUbject location tri- ABC angulated from distance estimates from.A, B, C lBCD = . from B, C, and D Etc. FIGURE 6 It is at this point that the validity of the assumption that individuals can make reliable and accurate judgments of relative distances within their stimulus domains must be considered. If the individual can make such judgments re- liably and accurately, it would seem to follow that the mag- nitude of Radius R would be small. Relatively large radii of individuals' proximity spheres could then be viewed as evidence that the second key theoretic assumption upon which 32 these procedures depend is invalid. Upon closer examination, however, we find that this need not be so. A proximity sphere of large radius about the individual may, indeed, be a result of unreliable distance estimates on the part of that individual. There is some theoretic justification, how— ever, for the possibility that such a large radius would be an indicant of low involvement with the issue, or a combina- tion of the two. If we view the size of an individual's proximity sphere as indicating the number of alternative placements he vis- ualizes himself as potentially occupying in the space, then it is plausible to consider the radius of this sphere as an indicant of involvement with the issue. Theoretically, a highly involved individual is strongly anchored in his own position, knows what that position is, and would be unlikely to provide distance estimates which would indicate the possi- bility of his occupying a wide range of other positions. Conversely, a subject who is not very involved, i.e., whose own position provides only a weak anchor, should be able to visualize himself as occupying a wider range of positions in the space. Thus, the radius of the proximity sphere about the individual may be a better quantitative estimator of involvement than the other procedures suggested to measure this variable earlier. Taken alone, this argument would seem to stymie the check on reliability of individual judg- ments which was potentially derivable from the magnitude of 33 radius R. Furthermore, even if R is an indicant of involve- ment, it may or may not also be an indicant of unreliability of individual judgments. Therefore, R cannot soundly be conceived of as a function of unreliability. Neither can it be utilized as an indicant of involvement, unless a check can be provided on the contribution of unreliability to its magnitude. An alternative measure of reliability of individual judgments of distances in the stimulus domain may be derived from the individuals' estimates of interpoint distances be- tween referents. Taking the position of the individual to be the center of the proximity sphere about him, it is pos- sible to compute the distances between each pair of referents which would be reported by an individual in that position who was reliably judging distances in the stimulus domain. The distances actually reported by the individual may then be subtracted from the distances he would have reported if his judgments had been accurate. These error terms in judg- ments of interpoint distances between referents from indi- viduals' perspectives may then be summed, and expressed as a percentage of the total of interpoint distances estimated. For example, in Figure 7, Subject 1, in a known position should perceive the interpoint distances between A and B, B and C, C and D, A and D, etc., as the magnitudes of the perpendiculars i, j, and k respectively. He reports esti- mates of those distances as i', j', and k'. The error (E) 34 , B, C, D = Referents Radius of proximity sphere mean location of sUbject A R 1 FIGURE 7 of judgmental capacity in the stimulus domain would be approximated by: E = i — i' + j - j' + k - k' ... + n - n' or, expressed as a percentage unreliability estimate (u): E U = i + j =*k ... + n X 100 The reliability (R) of judgmental capacity within the stimulus domain would then be estimated by: l - U = R. This reliability does two things. First, it provides a check of the theoretic assumption that individuals are capable of making reliable judgments of relative distances between referents within their stimulus domains. And second, it provides a figure of unreliability which can be compared to the magnitude of R. Such comparison potentially would allow utilization of the radius of the proximity sphere about the individual as a measure of involvement, 35 uncontaminated by unreliability. The question of the effi- cacy of such utilization is, therefore, an empirical one. CONCLUSION Procedures have been proposed, and deve10ped concep- tually, for precise test of social judgment predictions about message placement and, by extension, attitude change. These procedures meet the conceptual requirements of the theory, centering around the placement of referents, subjects, and messages in a stimulus domain, analogous to the conceptual space generated mathematically by these procedures. Precise quantification of the variables attitude, message structure, and involvement is potentially possible by these methods. Once such quantification is achieved, social judgment theory may be reformulated as a mathematical formula, directly testable by controlled experiment, and subject to falsifi- cation. CHAPTER II METHODS; STUDY I INTRODUCTION The procedures suggested depend for their viability upon two assumptions. Explicit recognition of these assump- tions is useful in identifying criteria by which the ade- quacy of an experimental test may be judged. The first is that multi-dimensional spaces in which individuals are the units of analysis, generated at two points in time, can be stabilized by inclusion of referent points, whose location relative to each other is stable, in both spaces. As discussed earlier, comparability of such spaces can be established if the stability of the spatial interrelationships among abstract alternative referents can be. To the degree that these relationships among referents are unstable, measurement of spatial dimensions relative to those referents must be considered unreliable. Correla- tions of referent locations to themselves at different points in time have been suggested as a measure of this sta- bility. Since the feasibility of these procedures depends on the assumption of stability of referents, a requirement that mean correlations be 3 .90 is considered necessary to justify these procedures. The second assumption upon which the utility of these procedures depends is that individuals can make reliable quantitative judgments of relative distances between points 36 37 within their stimulus domains. Procedures have been described for estimation of the unreliability of these judgments. No czprand requirement for such reliability is set, however, since the utility of predictions made more or less precise by such individual judgmental unreliabi- lity is essentially a pragmatic question. Experimentally, we wished to determine, through a series of experiments, the functional relations between discrepancy, involvement, and message structure which would yield accurate values of displacement as measured experimentally. A series of at least three experiments were required to achieve this, since the degree to which a message was structured in any one experiment could only have one value, and the relationship between message struc- ture and displacement could be curvilinear. Further repli- cations were desirable, however, as each new value of mes- sage structure for which values of displacement, discre- pancy, and involvement were known for individuals added to the precision with which the relationship between message structure and displacement could be estimated. Such a series of experiments, to yield meaningful results, was required to meet the following criteria: 1. They should allow for comparison of referent positions (stability of the aggregate spaces) for the same sample at two points in time, and for random samples drawn from the same population at one time. Additional stability measures for different random samples drawn from the 38 same population at different points in time were also desirable. 2. Individual's attitudes toward the topic, and involvement with the topic, should both be dispersed widely in ap- proximately normal distributions in the p0pulation from which samples were drawn. 3. The topic should be one about which public statements, pro, con, and neutral have been made which the subjects would recognize. One topic was used for this series of experiments, but later replications should be performed to assure generalizability of the functional relations across topics. 4. Messages on the topic in succeeding trials should vary widely in the degree to which they are structured. In this series of experiments, messages of varying struc- ture which expressed an approximately neutral attitude on the topic were used in the first three trials. Later messages expressed more extreme attitudes, in order to assure that the data collected would represent as wide a range of values for the principle variable, discre- pancy, as possible. These requirements were met by an offset series of pretest-postest with control experiments (represented schematically in Figure 8), and the procedures described below. 39 Group I N = I50 0ll X1 012 Group 2 N = 75 02' X2 022 Group 3 N = 75 03] X3 032 Group 4 N = 75 04‘ X“ 0&2 _ 7" 0 Group 5 N - 75 5] X5 052 * The total number of subjects required is reduced to 300 by random assignment of subjects from Group I to Groups A and 5. This procedures allows spatial stability (reliability) estimates to be computed for the same subjects over a longer period of time than simple pretest-postest measures. Since cross group reliability measures can be computed comparing Group l, Groups 2 and 3, this procedures does not reduce the number of reliability checks which can be made within the design. FIGIRE 8 EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN PROCEDURES Topic selection. Seventy-four students in two communication classes were presented with Likert Type items related to eleven different controversial topics. For each topic they were asked to indicate on a seven point scale the extent of their agreement-disagreement with a statement expressing an extreme stand on the issue (e.g., abortion is no better than murder). They were then asked to indicate how important each issue was to them on a seven point semantic differential. Finally, they were asked to indicate sources, other than interpersonal sources, from which they had obtained information 40 or opinions related to each topic. (See Appendix A). Coefficients of skewness were then computed for the responses to the Likert and semantic differential items. Of the ele- ven topics, two had non-skewed response distributions on both the attitude and the involvement measures. Visual inspection of a plot of these distributions indicated the possibility of a ceiling effect for the attitude measure on one of these t0pics. The nature of the topic (homosexual marriage) made the presence of such an effect seem plausible. The tOpic was then eliminated from consideration, because of the possibly artifactual nature of the non-skewed distri- bution of attitudes, and the remaining topic (railroad na- tionalization) was selected for the study. Sources from which students indicated that they had received information about the topic were then examined. Content of articles from the past five years dealing with railroad nationalization was analyzed, and yielded on hun- dred forty-four statements expressing a wide range of atti- tudes on the subject of railroad nationalization. These statements were all expressed in abstract, i.e., non spa- tio-temporally bound, form. (See Appendix B). Subject selection. Since there was no theoretic reason to believe that the functional relationships being examined in this study were specific to a particular type of subject population, student subjects were used. Generalizability of findings to other populations, however, will require future replications. 41 Three hundred and one students in seventeen communi- cation classes participated in the experiment. Some were required to participate in a study as a course requirement and some were not. Some received credit for participation and some did not. Participation in this particular study, however, was voluntary for all. Sign-up sheets were dis- tributed in each class, asking students to sign only if they were willing to devote from one to three hours of time outside of class to the study. Each S who signed these sheets was then assigned a number. Experimental groups 2, 3, 4 and 5 were then filled by assigning 85 to them sequen- tially as their number appeared in a table of random numbers. Identical procedures were used to randomly draw a sample of twenty Q-sort participants, each of whom was also a member of an experimental group, from the entire subject p0pu1a- tion. Group 1 was formed by combining groups 4 and 5, which therefore constituted randomized split-halves of group 1. Qfsort and referent selection. The one hundred forty-four abstract attitudinal statements which had been culled from students' information sources were sorted into eleven cate- gories by each of the twenty Q-sort particpants, in accor- dance with Thurstone's technique. One end of the eleven point scale was identified as representing an extreme laissez—faire attitude toward railroads, exemplified by the statement "The government should NOT interfere in any way with the railroad industry, either by regulating it OR by subsidizing it." The other end of the scale was identified 42 as representing an extreme pro-nationalization stand, exemplified by the statement "The government should own and operate all railroad facilities." Both of these state- ments were included among the statements to be sorted. 85 were then asked to place each statement in the category along the scale which most nearly approximated the atti- tude they perceived that statement to be expressing toward the railroad-government relationship. Data from three of the Q-sort participants were discarded because of misplacement of the two criterion statements. The purpose of the Q-sort was to identify re- ferents which were perceived unambiguously by 85 using the same criterion for distinction. Since misplacement of the criterion statements by these three 85 indicated that they were not making distinctions according to the given criter- ion, variance between their placements and those of the other 85 could not be taken as a valid indicant of ambi- guity in the referent statements themselves. Means and variances were computed for the placements of each of the statements by the remaining seventeen 85. (See Appendix B). Nine statements with extremely low variance in placement, with mean placements ranging in ap- proximately equal intervals across the eleven point scale, were then selected as referents. The adjacent pair of these statements whose mean placements were most central on the scale was chosen to define the unit of conceptual distance for the study, with the distance between them 43 being given as ten units. (See Table l). Pretest questionnaire. (Appendix C). The pretest ques- tionnaire presented all possible pairs of the nine refer- ent alternative, specifying that the first pair presented was separated by a distance of ten units. Order effects in the presentation of pairs of refer- ents were minimized in the following manner. The seven Q-sort cards with non-criterion referents were shuffled. The statement at the top of this deck was then presented eight times, paired with each of the remaining referents. The second statement was then presented, paired with each of the remaining seven statements, and so on. Ss were asked to estimate the distance between each pair in the same units of conceptual distance defined by the first pair. Following the presentation of referent pairs, 85 were asked to estimate the distance between "the way YOU feel about railroads" and the attitude expressed by each refer- ent. Next, 85 were asked to indicate which referents expressed attitudes they found acceptable, which expressed attitudes they found unacceptable and would reject, and which expressed attitudes which they would neither accept not reject. They were then asked to estimate the distance to the nearest attitude they would reject. Finally, demo- graphic data was solicited, including sex, race, age, hometown population, approximate family income, college rank, and grade point average. 44 TABLE 1 CONCEPT NUMBERS OF SCALED REFERENT STATEMENTS, WITH MEANS AND VARIANCES OF Q-SORT PLACEMENTS Mean Variance Q-Sort of Q-Sort Concept Statement Placement Placement 1.* THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY 5.58 1.25 2.* THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIP- MENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS 4.23 1.19 3. THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT 2.52 0.88 4. GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT 7.88 1.98 5. ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT 1.70 0.72 6. RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL 9.82 0.52 7. THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES 1.00 0.00 8. RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT 8.82 0.52 9. THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT OR BY SUBSIDIZING IT 11.00 0.00 10. THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS [Not included in Q-Sort] 11. THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE "ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION" [Not included in Q-Sort] * Denotes criterion statement pair defined as expressing opinions ten (10) Galileos apart. 45 Message construction. (See Appendix D). Five messages were required, of varying degrees of structure. The first of these was constructed from statements representing the entire range of attitudes on the topic, with a mean attitude expressed near neutrality, as determined by the Q-sort technique discussed earlier. This procedure was intended to produce a message which would be highly suscep- tible to displacement, i.e., highly unstructured and ambi- guous. The second message was constructed from statements representing a narrower range of attitudes, also with a mean near neutrality. This message was intended to be per- ceived as unstructured, but not as much so as the first. The third message was constructed from statements in an extremely narrow central range of attitudes expressed, and explicitly drew the conclusion that neutrality was the only reasonable stand on the issue. The fourth and fifth mes- sages expressed mean attitudes further from neutrality, in order to extend the range of subject-attitude distances from attitudes expressed in the messages. Both of these messages were constructed from a range of statements at one end of the scale, but neither drew explicit conclusions. This technique was intended to result in middle range per- ceptions of structure, but attitudinal deviance from neu- trality, with one message expressing a favorable and the other an unfavorable attitude toward railroad nationaliza- tion. Messages were presented in written form so as to avoid the possibility of physical or vocal characteristics 46 of a speaker on video or audio tape creating differential subject perceptions of source credibility. Messages were not attributed to any source or organization. Postest questionnaire. (Appendix E). The postest ques- tionnaire began with presentation of all possible pairs of referents, duplicating the first portion of the pretest questionnaire. 85 were then asked once again to estimate the distance between their own attitudes and that expressed by each referent. This procedure was designed to allow cross group stability (reliability) checks at each stage of the study. Messages were then presented as a page in the questionnaire. Finally, 85 were asked to estimate the distance between each of the referents and the attitude expressed by the message. Experimental procedure. One week before data collection began, each S was sent a letter informing him of the days he would receive questionnaires in his communication class. The appropriate questionnaire , precoded as to subject number, group, and treatment, was then distributed to each S on the same class day that other members of his experimen- tal group received the same form. 85 were instructed to complete the questionnaires at home and return them at the next class meeting. At that time the postest questionnaires were distributed. Deliveries and exchanges of completed for uncompleted questionnaires involving studentswho were absent from class were made on an individual basis at the 47 8'5 home between class meetings. These procedures were repeated~for each level of the study. CHAPTER III RESULTS; STUDY I ATTRITION AND RANDOMIZATION CHECK Three hundred Ss volunteered to participate in the study, and 231 provided usable data on all questionnaires distributed to their treatment groups. Six questionnaires were considered unusable, and the data from them discarded, because of repeated occurrences of responses greater than 1000 to items with mean responses for all 83 of less than 40. The remaining attrition was attributable to uncom- pleted or unreturned questionnaires. Of the group one 85, each of whom received four questionnaires, 121 completed and returned the first two, while 112 completed and returned all four. The result of this attrition, then, was that a total of 352 cases were observed (with repeated measures for each S), yielding ten treatment group observations (see design, Fig. 8). The largest n for any observation was 121 (011 5 012), while the smallest was 53 (051 G 052). One way analyses of variance and chi square tests revealed no significant differences between experimental groups on any of the measured demographic characteristics. STABILITY ESTIMATION To estimate the stability of the aggregate spaces across both groups and time the following procedure was employed. All data across all groups and measures was aggregated, 48 49 and a metric multidimensional space generated. This total aggregate space was then taken as the best estimate of the underlying structure of the culturally normative stimulus domain, i.e., as providing the best estimate of the spatial configuration which data gathered from each treatment group at each point in time should approximate if the scale was to be acceptedas reliable in the aggregate. This total aggregate space contained eleven factors (dimensions), the first seven of which had positive eigen roots, and the first three of which accounted for eighty- nine percent of the real (non-imaginary) distance in the space. None of the other non-imaginary dimensions accounted for more than four percent of the real distance in the space, and the seventh accounted for less than one percent. (See Table 2). Spaces were then generated from data gathered from each treatment group at each point in time. The largest number of real dimensions in any of these ten spaces was seven, and the smallest was six. Each of these ten spaces was then rotated into a least squares best fit with the total aggregate space. Product moment correlations were then computed between each vector representing a stable alternative referent in the total aggregate space and the corresponding vector in each of the ten treatment group spaces, taking the factor loadings (coordinates) of the concept vectors on each of the first six real dimensions as observations. The resulting correlation matrix 50 000.00, mm:.mm amp.:N—n mwm.m mm_.m —om.m mom.m- mac.— __m.:u mwo. :mN.~i :mm. u mom. i mmo.:n —— mmm.oo_ Nom.mm mmm.o_- mam. n NmN.—n mmm. mmw. on. i moo._u omm. nmm. u 0mm. mam.— mmm. o— mmm.mo— mmw.mm mmm.~n om—. :__.n Fm—.u mm:.u p:m.u om~.u m—m. mmm. mm_. NmN.- moo. w muzuu.m _— C— ox FNMmefiw hmwuzou Aw..oo_ mmm.mo_ Amm.oo_ mum.mm .sm.mm e.g.oo 1.xou ompzsouu< muz¢_h_hzuu_m do .NA. mmm. - sma..- Am_.m mm~.~- 05s.. - .mm..- oos.~ osm. moo.o- mmm.~- no“. m__._ N... am“. - mo_.~- mmo.m Amo._~ 50—. mm:.~ sm_.s .mo.: .mm.~ sm~.~ om:._ Now.~- _m~._ mm_._- .ms.n som.A_- ws~.m- soc. skm.s- :_~.~ ~o_.m m_m.m o“:._- .ms. smm.~- m~_. - mam.» mom.m_- wee. -o.m- N_s.s omo._- o~_. - mmm.m sum. mso.s mmm._ ems. woe..- m_o.__- m_m.~- -s.m- .om. em_._- Nmo.e- m~_.m - mwm.: muo. - mm_.:- Amm.~- o_~.m- mmm. m .w ..m m .N. a mzo_mzmz_o N mqmzou m :HHB .mmu quonmmmmmou :BHZ mu Emmozou mgmQDHm .onmmHHmu m< MQDHHZU<2 Hzm2m0m<223m v mqm40>z_ thmzm>40>z_ hzm2u>go>z_ :>uzuzuz mmhm 57 curvilinear relationship and accounting for nearly an additional four percent of variance. Involvement also pre- dicted significantly, as did its second and third power transformations,accounting for an additional three percent of variance. Also worth noting is the large negative zero order correlation between displacement and the adjusted involvement variable (-.44), which corresponds to theore- tical expectations and may be interpreted as an indication of construct validity. Message structure also predicted significantly in this analysis, although it added very little to the total variance explained. All together, the three predictors and their power transformations accounted for eighty four percent of the variance in computed values of displacement (r = .915, r2 = .838). Regression coefficients for significant predictors are given in Table 5. In inter- preting this table, and those provided for later analyses, it should be noted that the unadjusted slope (B) is a more informative figure than the standardized coefficient (Beta) in these analyses, since the spaces involved are metric. Signed values of displacement as criterion. The dependent variable ultimately of interest, however, was the signed value of displacement which distinquished between assimi- lation and contrast effects. Values for this variable were computed by subtracting the raw data subject report of the distance between the S's attitude and that expressed by the message from the figure for discrepancy computed in the multidimensional spaces. The mean value of this variable 58 TABLE 5 REGRESSION COEFFICIENTS FOR PREDICTORS OF DISPLACEMENT MAGNITUDES, STUDY 1 Variable _j1_ Beta DISCREPANCY -0.4134 -0.4685 DISCREPANCY2 0.6394x10‘2 1.7883 DISCREPANCY“ -0.2956x10‘7 -O.8027 INVOLVEMENT -8.6146x102 -2.6562 INVOLVEMENT2 4.0819x103 4.344s INVOLVEMENT3 -6.1295x103 -2.0838 MESSAGE STRUCTURE -3.9822 -0.0938 (CONSTANT) 79.0348 OVERALL F — 253.3597 MULTIPLE R — .915 DEGREES OF FREEDOM — 7; 344 R-SQUARE — .838 SIGNIFICANCE — Pl: .001 S9 for the 352 cases was 8.64, with a minimum of -282.70 and a maximum of 121.69. Regression analysis with signed values of displacement as the criterion variable (see Summary Table, Table 6) clearly indicated a quartic function of discrepancy to be the most powerful predictor.* Fourth, third, second and first power transformations of discrepancy were all significant predictors, and together accounted for slightly more than seventy two percent of the variance in 2=.723). Involvement approached the criterion (r=.850, r significance as a predictor (P=.051), but accounted for less than one half of one percent additional variance. None of the other predictors were significant. The most parsimon- ious predictions as to expected values of assimilation and contrast, then, can be made on the basis of the regression coefficients for discrepancy and its power transformations presented in Table 7. A plot of this predicted value curve is presented in Figure 9. CONCLUSION The results of Study I provided evidence of the via- bility of the assumptions upon which these scaling procedures depend. Cross group correlations of stable concept vectors * The possibility that this analysis might yield artifac- tually high figures for explained variance, as a result of having computed values for the dependent variable by subtrac- ting another variable from the independent variable, was re- cognized. Additional analyses, utilizing raw data discre- pancy figures as a criterion, were conducted for comparison with these analyses to check this possibility. Results did not indicate the presence of an artifact. These analyses are among those summarized in Appendix G. 60 moo. Hoo. NM“. Noo.u Noo. Hmm. Noo.u ooo. mmm. mwo.u Noo. mmm. Hmo.n Hoo. NNN. mmo.n moo. own. m:m.u Hoo. mmm. moo.u zoo. moo. Hmm.n oHH. mum. :mu.u mom. mom. m mgmz_m moz4o>z_ thm2m>oo>z_ hzmzw>40>z_ >ozozozoz o— mmbm H >Qbhm .onmmHHmU m< HszmU szon EHHZ onmmmmumm mom mqmm<223m o mHm<10‘1 -15.3807 DISCREPANCY 2.1996 2.4420 (CONSTANT) -l4.8737 OVERALL F——226.4829 MULTIPLE R-—.850 DEGREES OF FREEDOM — 4; 347 R-SQUARE-.723 SIGNIFICANCE - P i .001 DISPLACEMENT (+ = Assimilation Contrast) 150 l00 +50 '50 -l00 -I50 -200 62 '1“.-- ‘ 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 DISCREPANCY FIGURE 9 GRAPHIC SKETCH OF PREDICTED VALUES OF DISPLACEMENT AS A FUNCTION OF DISCREPANCY; STUDY I 63 provided evidence of a high degree of stability in the configuration of abstractly phrased attitudinal referents, at least across short periods of time. The substantial amounts of dependent variable variance explained using individual 85 as units of analysis made it possible to conclude directly that individuals could make sufficiently reliable discrepancy judgments to be pragmatically useful, since variations in individual judgments due to unreliabi- lity must, by definition, be unsystematic. The quartic function of discrepancy identified using these procedures as a predictor of displacement did not, however, conform to theoretic expectations. Inspection of Figure 9 reveals that contrast effects are predicted for extremely low values of discrepancy, contrary to theo- retic expectations, and for values of discrepancy so high as to represent advocacy of attitude change several times as great as the distance between the criterion statements used to define the end points of the scale in the earlier Q-sort procedure. For more moderate ranges of discrepancy, assimilation effects are predicted, with larger values of discrepancy generally yielding predictions of more assimi- lation. CHAPTER IV METHODS; STUDY 11 INTRODUCTION As noted in the conclusion of the preceding chapter, the results of Study I tended to support the assumptions of the scaling procedures utilized. These results also indicated that further research should be conducted, how- ever, to address a number of additional questions. First, the question of alternative referent stability across time periods greater than the two week span covering data col- lection in the first study needed to be addressed. Second, replication of the first study was considered to be called for in light of the fact that the assimilation-contrast curve (Figure 9) derived from Study I data did not conform to theoretic expectations. Third , the high levels of explained variance in individual differences in the percep- tion of messages suggested that it might be fruitful to utilize the scaling procedures deve10ped in the first study in a controlled laboratory setting with attitude change as the dependent variable. Finally, since the oper- ationalization of involvement depended upon an assumption of Euclideanism of the stimulus domain, i.e. that loadings on dimensions with negative eigen roots would be indica- tive of concept sizes in a Euclidean real space, a further attempt to validate the involvement measure was suggested. A second study was conducted two years after Study I to address these questions. 64 65 STABILITY CHECK PRETEST Questionnaire construction. (See Appendix H). For reasons cited in Chapter I, it might be expected that configurations of attitudinal referents generated from sample data be- tween two groups would differ if the distributions of attitudes in those two groups differed significantly. To provide means to determine if such differences existed, the unidimensional attitude and importance scales for the topic of railroad nationalization from the topic selection questionnaire (Appendix A) of Study I were included in the questionnaire. The remainder of the questionnaire con- sisted of the nine stable attitudinal referents used in Study 1, presented in all possible pairs and in the iden- tical format as in the pretest questionnaires (Appendix C) of the first study. Subject selection. As in the first study, 53 were volun- teers solicited from undergraduate communication classes. Experimental procedure. Subjects were given questionnaires in their communication classes and asked to take them home and complete them. Questionnaires were returned at the next class meeting. Results of stability check pretest. Approximately one hundred twenty questionnaires were distributed to students who volunteered to take them home and complete them. Seventy three were returned completed. Analysis of data from the unidimensional attitude 66 and involvement measures revealed no significant differences in the mean responses obtained from this sample and those obtained from the topic selection sample of Study 1. Dis- tributions of responses on both of these measures were also non-skewed, as they had been in the previous sample. Discrepancy estimation data obtained from two SS were discarded because of repeated occurrences of responses greater than 1000 to items with mean responses less than 40. Discrepancy estimation data from the remaining 71 Ss were utilized to generate an aggregate space, which was then rotated into a least squares best fit with the total aggre— gate space from Study 1. Correlations between each concept vector in the stability check space and the corresponding vector in the total aggregate space were then computed, just as in the cross group stability check of Study 1. These correlations were converted to 25, averaged, and the mean Z reconverted to a correlation. (See Table 8). This mean correlation (.938) was of the same order as the cross group figure obtained in the first study (.948), and was interpreted as indicating a high level of stability in the configuration of abstractly phrased attitudinal refer- ents across a two year period. PROCEDURES Questionnaire construction. Given the evidence of the sta- bility check pretest that the configuration of stable atti- tudinal referents was, in fact, stable across long periods of time as well as across groups, questionnaires for the 67 TABLE 8 CORRELATIONS BETWEEN STABLE CONCEPT VECTORS IN THE TOTAL AGGREGATE SPACE OF STUDY I AND CORRESPONDING VECTORS IN THE STABILITY CHECK PRETEST SPACE OF STUDY 11, WITH E CONVERSIONS CONCEPT r z 1 .880 1.376 2 .981 2.324 3 .961 1.959 4 .809 1.124 5 .936 1.705 6 .917 1.570 7 .972 2.127 8 .648 0.772 9 .987 2.516 E = 1.719 .938 ”I u 68 second study did not include items asking SS to estimate the interpoint distances between these stable referents. Rather, interpoint distances between stable concepts generated by the total aggregate of Study I were taken to represent the best estimate of the normatively perceived distances. Location of individuals and messages in the space therefore required only estimation by each S of the distance between his own attitude and each stable referent, distance between the attitude expressed by the message and each stable referent, and distance of the individual's own attitude to that expressed by the message. Pretest questionnaires. (Appendix I). In light of the above considerations, pretest questionnaires included only those items asking respondents to estimate distances between their own attitudes and each of the stable attitudinal referents. These items were presented in the same order and format as in the first study. Demographic items dupli- cating those in the pretest questionnaires of Study I were also included to allow for a randomization check. Addi- tionally, a semantic differential type scale was included, which was intended to tap the perceived importance of the topic of railroad nationalization to 55. This item was included to provide a means of independently validating the involvement Operationalization. Postest questionnaires. (Appendix J). Postest question- naires for the five experimental groups each began with 69 the presentation of a persuasive message on the topic of railroad nationalization. The same five messages were used as in the first study (see Appendix D), both to provide a wide range of possible levels of discrepancy and message structure and to provide a means to compare data from the two studies. Following the presentation of the message, each questionnaire included items asking Ss to estimate the distances between their own attitudes and those expressed by the stable referents, the attitude expressed by the message and each of the stable referents, and their own attitude and the attitude expressed by the message. The postest questionnaire for the control group du- plicated the pretest questionnaire, with the exception that the unidimensional involvement measure and the demo- graphic items were deleted. Subject selection. Subjects for Study II were once again volunteers from undergraduate communication classes, some of whom received credit for participating and some of whom did not. Approximately one week before the data were to be collected, 55 were asked in their communication classes to sign up to participate in the study. They were also asked at this time to provide phone numbers and approxi- mate times when data were to be collected when they expec- ted to participate. Each S was then called the evening before he expected to participate and reminded of the 70 commitment in order to minimize attrition. Experimental procedures. Each S was given an identical pretest questionnaire upon arrival at the room where data were being collected. Upon completion of this quesionnaire, it was returned and a postest questionnaire distributed. The order of distribution of the different forms of the postest questionnaires was random. This was accomplished by having previously stacked the forms in the order in which the treatment group numbers appeared as the last digit in a table of random numbers, and by distributing the forms to Ss sequentially from the top of the stack. The result of this random distribution was that 85 were assigned, as they received their postest questionnaires, to one of the five experimental groups or to the control group. Each S was requested to supply his student number on the cover page of both forms to allow matching of pre and postest forms. CHAPTER V RESULTS; STUDY II PARTICIPATION AND RANDOMIZATION CHECK Data were collected from a total of one hundred and six 85 over a three day period. Data obtained from three of these Ss were discarded because of repeated occurrences of responses greater than 1000 to discrepancy estimation items for which mean responses were less than 40. Eighteen of the one hundred and three 85 who provided useable data were assigned to the control group. Treatment groups receiving Messages 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 (see Appendix D) were assigned l6, l6, l8, l6 and 19 Ss respectively, for a total of 85 treatment group observations. One way analyses of variance and Chi square tests revealed no significant differences between groups on any of the measured demogra- phic characteristics or on responses to the semantic differ- ential type topic importance scale. OPERATIONALIZATION OF PREDICTORS Hybrid spaces representing the aggregate space as viewed by each individual in the treatment groups at both pre and postest observations were generated by the same procedure as in Study 1. Given the evidence of stability of the configuration of abstractly phrased attitudinal referents obtained in the stability check pretest, and the relative sizes of the sample for the stability check pretest and the total aggregate of Study I, mean interpoint distance 71 72 estimates obtained from the total aggregate in Study 1, rather than from the stability check pretest sample, were taken as the best estimate of normatively perceived inter- point distances and were duplicated as the first nine columns of the hybrid matrices. The criterion utilized in the rotation of these spaces was also the total aggregate space of the first study. Involvement was Operationalized, as in the first study, as the reciprocal of the mean magnitude of the coor- dinate values of each individual (as a concept) in his hybrid space on the two factors with the largest negative eigen roots. In this study, loadings on these factors in pretest hybrid spaces were utilized. The mean value of this variable for the 85 treatment group cases was .139, with a maximum of .889 and a minimum of .025. Attitudinal discrepancy, or distance from the message, was operationalized, as in the first study, as the geome- tric distance between the location of the individual in his hybrid space and the location of the message in the aggregate space for the treatment group which had received the same message in the first study. Aggregate treatment group spaces from the first study were taken to provide better estimates of normative message locations than corresponding spaces generated from Study 11 data because of the larger sample sizes involved in Study I. The mean value of discrepancy for the 85 treatment group observa- tions was 22.225, with a maximum of 80.705, and a minimum 73 of 7.670. Note that while the mean value of discrepancy for this sample is of approximately the same magnitude as for the Study I sample (23.908), the maximum value obtained is far smaller. The maximum value of discrepancy obtained in the Study I sample was 317.300. This difference in the ranges of discrepancy values in the two samples will be useful to keep in mind in interpreting the results of the regression analyses reported in the next section. Since the same messages were used in the present study as in Study I, and since the sample sizes of treat- ment groups in Study I were considerably larger than in the present study, values of message structure Obtained from Study I data were utilized in Study 11. REGRESSION ANALYSES As in the first study, discrepancy, message struc- ture, and involvement were submitted as predictor variables, along with second, third, and fourth order power transfor- mations of each of them, to each of the four stepwise multiple regression analyses reported below. The first two of these analyses replicate the regression analyses from Study 1. In the last two magnitudes of attitude change and signed values of attitude change are the cri- terion variables. Displacement magnitude as criterion. The criterion variable for the first regression, displacement magnitude, was oper- ationalized as the geometric distance between the location 74 of the message in the individual's postest hybrid space and the location of the message in the aggregate treat- ment group space for the Study I treatment group which had received the same message. The mean value for this variable for the 85 treatment group cases was 17.707, with a minimum of 3.173 and a maximum of 59.451. Note that, as with discrepancy, this mean value is of comparable magnitude to the mean magnitude of displacement in the Study I sample (16.860), but that the maximum value is far less than the maximum value in the Study I sample (283.509). Regression analyses with displacement magnitude as the criterion (see Summary Table, Table 9) confirmed the Study 1 finding that discrepancy was a significant linear predictor of displacement magnitude (F= 44.529; df.l,83; p.: .001), accounting individually for thirty five percent of the variance in magnitude of displacement (r= .591, r2= .349). No other predictors were individually signifi- cant, although the fourth power of discrepancy approached significance (p = .069) and added nearly three percent to variance explained. The unadjusted slope (B) of dis- crepancy was .416, with a constant of 8.459. Beta was .591. The unadjusted slope of discrepancy as a sole pre— dictor of displacement magnitude (Step 1 of the stepwise multiple regression) in Study I, which corresponds to the figure above, was .764, with a constant of -l.413. Beta at this step was .866. Seventy five percent of the variance 75 «m:. ooo. mm_.u ooo. mo~.a moo. oom.u moo. NNN.1 H—o. NH:. oNo. .mm. mom. mqmz_m mozmozqo>z_ ammohuamhm mo4o>z_ :>uzuz mmhm 76 in displacement magnitudes was explained at this step. (See Table 4). In both studies, then, the magnitude of displacement was found to generally increase as a linear function of discrepancy. Study I data included a much greater range of both discrepancy and displacement magnitude values. Extremely high values of these variables must have occurred in a small number of Study I cases, however, since the mean values of these variables for the two samples were of com- parable magnitudes. Deviation scores for these cases were large, with the result that a regression line which fit them would explain a considerable percentage of dependent variable variance by fitting a small number of cases. If this were the case, both the slope obtained and the per- centage of variance explained by the Study I data would be inflated. Consequently, the figures obtained from Study 11 data may more accurately reflect the relationship be- tween discrepancy and displacement magnitudes in normative ranges. Signed values of displacement as criterion. As in Study 1, signed values for displacement (assimilation and contrast) were computed by subtracting raw data subject reports of the distance between S's attitude and the attitude expres- sed by the message from the figure for discrepancy computed in the multidimensional spaces. The mean value for this variable for the 85 treatment group cases was 9.967, with a minimum of -22.903 and a maximum of 72.108. Corresponding men1 dis< dffi the Noni nor pla: The C011: and ana 0f Exa cur rep lin As tha “Um! and 77 figures obtained from Study I data were -282.70 and +121.69. Regression analysis with signed values of displace- ment as the criterion (see Summary Table, Table 10) showed discrepancy to be a significant linear predictor (F = 42.790; df.l,83; p i .001), accounting for thirty four percent of the variance in the dependent variable (r = .583, r2 = .340). None of the other predictors were individually significant, nor did any of them add more than one percent to the ex- plained variance when entered into the regression equation. The unadjusted slope for discrepancy was .535, with a constant of -l.9l4. Beta was .583. At first glance, this function appears to bear little correspondence to the quartic function of discrepancy derived from Study I data to yield predicted values of assimilation and contrast, which is presented in Table 7 and graphically presented in Figure 9. As in the preceding analysis, however, interpretation requires consideration of the ranges of the variables represented in the data set. Examination of Figure 9 reveals that the portion of the curve in the range of discrepancy from eight to eighty represented in this data set does in fact approximate a line of positive slope with a small negative intercept. As in the previous analysis, it is possible to conclude that the figure for explained variance obtained from ana- lysis of Study I data may have been inflated by a small number of cases representing extreme values of discrepancy, and that the figure obtained from analysis of Study 11 78 Nmo.u moo. o_~.1 moo. mm_.i m-o. wN_.u moo. Nmm. Noo. mom. moo. mom. com. a mgmz_m moz<=o m¢4o>2_ hzmzm>qo>z_ auxahuomhm mwuzozoz mmhm HH wnahm .onmmHHmu m< HszmU szuHm :HHZ onmmmmomm mom mgmm<22=m oH mqm<9 79 data may be more realistic in normative ranges of discrep- ancy. Magnitude of attitude change as criterion. Magnitude of at- titude change was operationalized as the geometric distance between the individual S's location in his pretest hybrid space and his location in his postest hybrid space.* The mean value of this variable for the 85 treatment group cases was 17.199, with a maximum of 120.671 and a minimum of 1.667. Regression analysis with attitude change magnitude as the criterion (see Summary Table, Table 11) revealed dis- crepancy as a powerful linear predictor, accounting indi- vidually for seventy-six percent of the variance in atti- tude change magnitudes (r = .870, r = .758). Message structure was also a significant predictor (p i .005) and explained two percent additional variance. Regression coefficients for these predictors are provided in Table 12. * Initially, values for magnitude of attitude change were obtained by subtracting the average motion vector from pre to postest in the control group from the difference be- tween the S's pretest and postest distances from the message. Regression analysis was performed with this variable as the criterion. The amount of variance explained in this control- led value of magnitude of attitude change was sufficiently lower than the explained variance in the analyses reported here to lead to the conclusion that correcting for effects of testing observed in the control group was actually intro- ducing unsystematic variance into the dependent variable values. This may have occurred because the control group was too small to yield accurate estimation of testing ef- fects, or because testing effects varied across individual 85. In light of the other findings of these studies, the latter explanation seems more plausible. The Summary Table for the regression with controlled values of attitude change magnitudes as the criterion is presented in Appendix K. 80 No_.- mum. omm. :Nm.a mm..- mm... onm. x m4m2_m HH >QDHm .onmmHHmo m< mQDHHZU<2 muzm<223m ooo. oHo. ooo. ooo. moo. mmo. wmm. mozqo>2_ m>ozuzgo>z_ ammohuoth mouz mmhm 81 TABLE 12 REGRESSION COEFFICIENTS FOR PREDICTORS OF ATTITUDE CHANGE MAGNITUDES, STUDY II Variable _§_. Beta DISCREPANCY 1.334 0.927 MESSAGE STRUCTURE 9.630 0.161 (CONSTANT) -20.816 OVERALL F - 45.6584 MULTIPLE R - .883 DEGREES OF FREEDOM - 2; 82 R-SQUARE - .780 SIGNIFICANCE - P g .001 82 Signed values of attitude changeas criterion. Signed values of attitude change were obtained by subtracting each S's postest distance from the normative message location from his pretest distance from the normative message location.* The mean value of this variable for the 85 cases was -.443, with a minimum of -l3.435 and a maximum of 21.816. Regression analysis with signed values of attitude change as the criterion (see Summary Table, Table 13) re- vealed a polynomial function including discrepancy, second and fourth power transformations of discrepancy, message structure, second and fourth power transformations of mes- sage structure, and involvement as significant predictors. Taken together, these variables accounted for sixty-three percent of the variance in signed values of attitude change 2: (multiple R = .791, r .626). Regression coefficients for these predictors are presented in Table 14. Correlational validation of involvement. In an attempt to check the convergent validity of the involvement operation- alization utilized in these studies, the zero order * As in the preceding analysis, effects of testing observed in the control group were removed in a previous Operationalization. Regression analysis with controlled values of signed attitude change as the criterion yielded a function similar 50 that reported here, but which explain- ed less variance (r =.464), suggesting that either differ- ential effects of testing across individuals or inadequate control group sample size had resulted in attempts to con- trol for effects of testing actually introducing unsystema- tic variance into the data. The Summary Table for this ear- lier regression is presented in Appendix L. 83 omo.u Noo. mo_.n m_o. mm_.u «No. mmm. Noe. o__.u mm_. omo.n _mo. moo. mom. mom. omu. m m4¢z_m moz4o>z. hzmzm>qo>z_ owxohusth moozuzuz MJ’U‘ mmhm HH woahm .onmmHHmU m< muz nmzuHm EHHZ onmmmmumm mom mHmm<223w MH mqm4 .05 .17 .17 .17 .17 .23 .35 .52 .52 .64 .70 .76 .82 .90 2. 55 .52 .90 .15 .40 .19 .24 .13 .38 .36 .97 .06 .77 .97 101 Statement LEGISLATORS SHOULD ACT ON PERMANENT LEGIS- LATION TO PREVENT RAILROAD WORK STOPPAGES THE DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION SHOULD HAVE THE OPTION OF BECOMING INVOLVED IN MANAGEMENT TO TRY TO MAKE THE RAILROADS PROFITABLE THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD BUY OR BUILD FREIGHT CARS AND THEN RENT OR LEASE THEM TO THE RAILROADS RAILROAD MANAGEMENT SHOULD INITIATE AND PURSUE PLANS SUBMITTED TO THEM BY THE SECRETARY OF TRANSPORTATION THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT SHOULD SPONSOR RESEARCH ON IMPROVED RAILROAD FACILITIES LIKE IT DOES FOR AIRPLANES RAILROAD FREIGHT SERVICE SHOULD BE MAIN- TAINED IN THE U.S. IN THE NATIONAL INTEREST THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS RAILROADS SHOULD BE PRIVATELY OWNED AND GOVERNMENT OPERATED A NATIONAL COMPUTER SYSTEM SHOULD BE BUILT BY THE GOVERNMENT TO HELP THE RAIL- ROADS OPERATE MORE EFFICIENTLY CONGRESS SHOULD MAKE MAJOR CHANGES IN BASIC LABOR LAWS TO PREVENT FUTURE RAILROAD SHUTDOWNS THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD ASSIST THE RAILROADS IN MEETING THEIR LOCOMOTIVE AND FREIGHT CAR NEEDS RAILROADS CAN NO LONGER MAKE A REASONABLE; PROFIT IN THE UNITED STATES TRANSPORTATION WORKERS SHOULD ONLY BE ALLOWED TO STRIKE AGAINST A FEW RAILROADS AT A TIME >q .94 .00 .05 .05 .11 .17 .23 .23 .29 .29 .35 .41 .47 6 .43 .62 .05 .80 .61 .40 .19 .56 .47 .47 .61 .00 .13 102 Statement RAILROAD MANAGEMENT OFTEN IS LESS THAN MEDIOCRE CONGRESS SHOULD REVAMP THE STRIKE-HANDLING MACHINERY FOR THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY EVEN BRIEF RAILROAD STRIKES BRING LAYOFFS IN INDUSTRY AND CUTBACKS IN PRODUCTION RAIL SERVICE MUST BE PROVIDED AT ALL COSTS IF THE RAILROADS WERE NATIONALIZED, THE TAXPAYERS SHOULD IMMEDIATELY PAY FOR IMPROVEMENT OF TRAINS AND STATIONS GOVERNMENT MANAGEMENT OF RAILROADS WOULD PROBABLY BE JUST ABOUT AS EFFICIENT AS PRIVATE MANAGEMENT THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD GUARANTEE LOANS TO THE RAILROADS TO HELP THEM STAY IN BUSINESS THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD LOAN MONEY TO THE RAILROADS TO IMPROVE THEIR FACILITIES AND SERVICES RAILROAD LABOR DISPUTES SHOULD BE RESOLVED BY COMPULSORY ARBITRATION RAILROADS SHOULD BE PRIVATELY OWNED AND OPERATED, BUT REGULATED BY THE GOVERNMENT RAILROAD STRIKES ARE INCONVENIENT FOR COMMUTERS THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD SUPPLY BARRICADES AND SAFETY EQUIPMENT AT ALL HIGHWAY RAILROAD CROSSINGS THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD PROVIDE TAX INCENTIVES FOR THE RAILROADS TO IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT AND SERVICES RAILROAD PASSENGER SERVICE SHOULD BE MAIN- TAINED FOR THE PUBLIC GOOD THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP SUPPORT ONLY THOSE RAILROADS IN DANGER OF BANKRUPTCY >4 .47 .52 .64 .64 .76 .76 .88 .94 .94 .00 .11 .11 .11 .23 .23 5. 51 .38 .86 .86 .69 .94 .61 .68 .05 .12 .98 .48 .98 .69 .19 103 Statement IF THE GOVERNMENT IS GOING TO CONTINUE TO SUBSIDIZE TRUCKING AND AIRLINES BY‘ BUILDING HIGHWAYS AND AIRPORTS, THEN IT SHOULD DO THE SAME FOR THE RAILROADS RAILROADS SHOULD HAVE THE SAME STATUS AS PUBLIC UTILITIES, PRIVATELY OWNED BUT GOVERNMENT REGULATED THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY THE RAILROADS SHOULD BE PROTECTED BY LAW FROM COMPETITORS IN THE TRANSPORTATION INDUSTRY THE EXISTENCE OF RAILROAD FREIGHT SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY THERE ARE NO GOVERNMENT BUILT RAILROAD TRACKS FOR THE RAILROADS TO USE, SO TRUCKS SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED TO RUN ON GOVERNMENT BUILT HIGHWAYS THE BURDEN OF PASSENGER SERVICE LOSSES SHOULD BE LIFTED FROM THE RAILROADS THROUGH TAX BREAKS AND SUBSIDIES RAILROADS ARE GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION WOULD REQUIRE LARGE GOVERNMENT EXPENDITURES TO BUILD BETTER TRAINS SKILLED RAILROAD WORKERS DESERVE MORE PAY WORK RULES AND LABOR PRACTICES IN THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY SHOULD BE MODERNIZED GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAX TRUCKERS MORE HEAVILY TO HELP PAY FOR HIGHWAYS AND MAKE TRUCKS LESS COMPETITIVE WITH THE RAILROADS RAILROADS SHOULD ABANDON UNECONOMICAL LINES THAT ARE NOT IN THE PUBLIC INTEREST THE RAILROADS SHOULD NOT BE GIVEN ANY TAX BREAKS THAT ARE NOT ALSO GIVEN TO TRUCKERS AND AIRLINES >q .47 .50 .58 .58 .58 .59 .64 .76 .94 .11 .11 .17 .23 .41 .76 .62 .25 .25 .75 .50 .24 .56 .05 .11 .36 .02 .81 .00 104 Statement THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD ENCOURAGE PRIVATELY OWNED RAILROADS TO MERGE IN ORDER TO INCREASE EFFICIENCY RAILROADS DO NOT RUN ON GOVERNMENT TRACKS, SO TRUCKS SHOULD NOT USE PUBLIC ROADS THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS BECOME MORE SELF SUPPORTING SO THAT THEY CAN BE FREED OF THE REGULATION THAT GOES ALONG WITH SUBSIDIES RAILROADS ARE A PUBLIC SERVICE, SO THAT THEIR INCOME SHOULD NOT BE TAXED RAILROADS SHOULD BE GIVEN TAX BREAKS RAILROADS SHOULD BE RELIEVED OF THE BURDEN OF INEQUITABLE LOCAL TAXATION THE RAILROADS COULD RECOVER FINANCIALLY IF THE REST OF THE ECONOMY WAS IN BETTER SHAPE RAILROADS SHOULD DIVERSIFY THEIR FINANCIAL INTERESTS WHEN A RAIL STRIKE OCCURS, THE PRESIDENT SHOULD HAVE TO GO TO CONGRESS FOR SPECIAL LEGISLATION IF HE WANTS TO INTERVENE THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP RESTORE THE RAILROADS TO COMPETITIVE HEALTH BECAUSE NATIONALIZATION OF THE RAIL- ROADS WOULD BE MORE COSTLY AND LESS EFFICIENT RAILROADS SHOULD NOT HAVE TO PAY TAXES GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT BUILD AIRPORTS FOR THE AIRLINES, BECAUSE THAT IS UNFAIR TO PRIVATELY OWNED RAILROADS THAT MUST COMPETE WITH THEM LAWS SHOULD BE PASSED WHICH WILL MAKE IT POSSIBLE FOR THE RAILROADS TO MAKE A PROFIT ON THEIR OWN RAILROAD LABOR SHOULD HAVE THE RIGHT TO SELECTIVELY STRIKE AGAINST ONE OR TWO COMPANIES AT A TIME XI .47 .76 .82 .00 .23 .23 .29 .47 .47 .47 .64 .64 .70 .76 3. 13 .19 .15 .50 .19 .19 .97 .13 .88 .51 .74 .61 .84 .44 105 Statement IF THE GOVERNMENT OWNED THE RAILROADS, TAXES WOULD HAVE TO BE RAISED TO SUPPORT THEM GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT BUILD HIGHWAYS, BECAUSE THAT GIVES TRUCKERS AN UNFAIR COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE OVER THE RAILROADS THE RAILROADS SHOULD NOT BE CENTRALLY MANAGED BECAUSE THEN THEY WOULD BE TOO POWERFUL THE RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DIS— CONTINUE UNPROFITABLE PASSENGER SERVICE RAILROAD MANAGEMENT SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO STREAMLINE ITS WORK FORCE GOVERNMENT MANAGEMENT OF RAILROADS WOULD RESULT IN POORER SERVICE TO FREIGHT SHIPPERS IF THE GOVERNMENT OWNED THE RAILROADS, IT WOULD HAVE AN UNFAIR COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE OVER TRUCKERS AND AIRLINES LEGAL BARRIERS TO OWNERSHIP OF DIFFERENT FORMS OF TRANSPORTATION BY THE SAME COMPANY SHOULD BE REMOVED THE RAILROADS SHOULD BE PERMITTED TO EARN A RATE OF RETURN ON INVESTMENT SUFFI- CIENT TO ATTRACT PRIVATE CAPITAL IF THE GOVERNMENT RAN THE RAILROADS THEY WOULD PROBABLY LOSE TREMENDOUS AMOUNTS OF MONEY THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY SHOULD NOT BE AS CAREFULLY REGULATED AS IT IS NOW THE RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO LAY OFF WORKERS WHOSE JOBS ARE NO LONGER NECESSARY IF THE GOVERNMENT BOUGHT THE NATION'S RAILROADS FROM THEIR PRIVATE OWNERS, THE COST TO THE TAXPAYER WOULD BE GREAT >q .76 .76 .82 .94 .05 .05 .23 .23 .35 .35 .41 .47 .52 5. 31 .69 .77 .30 .05 .68 .81 .06 .99 .36 .00 .38 .01 106 Statement RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO EARN AN ADEQUATE RETURN ON INVESTMENT RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO OWN AND OPERATE TRUCKING COMPANIES AND AIRLINES RAILROADS SHOULD BE NATIONALIZED ONLY AS A LAST RESORT THE RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO AUTO- MATE THEIR EQUIPMENT WITHOUT LABOR LAWS STOPPING THEM THE TAXPAYER SHOULD NOT HAVE TO SHOULDER THE BURDEN OF A HIGH COST NATION- ALIZED RAILWAY SYSTEM RAILROAD MANAGEMENT SHOULD HAVE THE RIGHT TO FIRE UNNECESSARY WORKERS TO STAY IN BUSINESS PRIVATELY OWNED RAILROADS SHOULD BE ENCOURAGED TO MERGE TO INCREASE EFFICIENCY RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO MERGE IN ORDER TO INCREASE PROFITS RAILROADS SHOULD NOT BE EXPECTED TO SUR- VIVE UNDER GOVERNMENT REGULATION THAT TREATS THEM LIKE MONOPOLIES RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT FREIGHT SERVICE WOULD NOT IMPROVE ANY IF THE RAILROADS WERE GOVERNMENT OWNED RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN PRICING THEIR SERVICES RAILROADS SHOULD BE PRIVATELY OWNED BECAUSE WORKERS WOULD NOT BE ALLOWED TO STRIKE AGAINST THE GOVERNMENT IF 1 IT OWNED THE RAILROADS RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PASSENGER RATES >4 .58 .58 .58 .64 .64 .76 .76 .76 .76 .82 .82 .82 .88 .94 .75 .50 .63 .99 .36 .56 .81 .81 .94 .77 .02 .65 .11 .68 107 Statement RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO CHANGE THEIR RATES WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL MAXIMUM OPERATING EFFICIENCY OF THE RAIL- ROADS WOULD ONLY BE ACHIEVED BY MAXIMUM PROFIT MAKING INCENTIVE PRIVATELY OWNED RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO MERGE TO INCREASE EFFICIENCY LABOR LAWS IMPOSED ON RAILROADS BY GOVERN- MENT ARE OUTDATED, INCOMPATIBLE WITH MODERN TECHNOLOGY, AND SHOULD BE REPEALED RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO MERGE IN ORDER TO INCREASE OPERATING EFFICIENCY NATIONALIZATION OF THE RAILROADS WOULD LEAD TO NATIONALIZATION OF OTHER INDUSTRIES AND THE COLLAPSE OF OUR FREE ENTERPRISE SYSTEM STRICT ECONOMIC REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE REMOVED SO THAT RAILROADS CAN EARN A REASONABLE PROFIT STRICT GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD FREIGHT RATES SHOULD BE REMOVED SO THAT THEY CAN EARN A REASONABLE PROFIT THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE WITH ANY RAILROAD WHICH MAKES A PROFIT RAILROADS ARE BUSINESSES, AND THE ONLY PROPER INCENTIVE FOR ANY BUSINESS IS THE PROFIT MOTIVE RAILROADS SHOULD CONTINUE TO OPERATE WITH THE FREE ENTERPRISE INCENTIVES THAT HAVE ALLOWED THEM TO DEVELOP SO MUCH, SO FAST, IN THIS COUNTRY STRICT LEGAL REGULATIONS OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE REMOVED SO THAT THEY CAN EARN A PAIR PROFIT >q .11 .11 .17 .17 .17 .23 .29 .35 .35 .35 .35 .52 10. .36 .86 .15 .52 .52 81 .84 .24 .86 .11 .36 .51 108 Statement THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE WITH RAILROAD LABOR DISPUTES THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERVENE IN RAILROAD LABOR DISPUTES NATIONALIZATION WOULD ROB RAILROAD STOCK- HOLDERS OF THEIR INVESTMENT ANTI-MONOPOLY REGULATIONS SHOULD BE REMOVED FROM THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT AMERICAN WORKERS HAVE COME TO ENJOY A GOOD LIFE UNDER FREE ENTERPRISE, 30 PRIVATE OWNERSHIP OF THE RAILROADS SHOULD BE CONTINUED RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO MERGE AND EXPAND, EVEN IF THEY GET A MONOPOLY RAILROADS SHOULD BE PRIVATELY OWNED AND OPERATED, AND NOT SUBJECT TO GOVERN- MENT REGULATION THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY SHOULD BE LEFT ALONE BY THE GOVERNMENT SO THAT IT CAN BEGIN OPERATING PROFITABLY THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT OR BY SUBSIDIZING IT 10. 10 10 10. 11. >4 .52 .58 .64 .70 .82 .88 00 .47 .47 58 00 1. 13 .75 .24 .47 .52 .98 .00 .51 .01 .50 .00 APPENDIX C PRETEST QUESTIONNAIRE FROM STUDY I APPENDIX C PRETEST QUESTIONNAIRE FROM STUDY I MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF COMMUNICATION ARTS EAST LANSING ' MI ° “8824 DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNICATION Dear Participant: This questionnaire asks you to tell us how different (or in other words, how "far apart”) Opinions about railroad nationalization are. Differ- ence between opinions can be measured in Galileos. A Galileo is a unit of conceptual distance, much as an inch is a unit of physical distance. The more different two Opinions are, the more Galileos apart from each other they are. To help you know how big a Galileo is, the difference, or distance between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE 0F PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS is TEN (IO) Galileos. In other words, these two Opinions are ten Galileos "apart”. You are supposed to tell us how many Galileos apart you think the Opinions in the questionnaire are. Remember, the more different two Opinions are, the bigger the number of Galileos apart they are. If you think that any of the pairs of opinions in the questionnaire are more different than the two opinions mentioned above, then you would write a number bigger than ten. If you think that they are not so different, then you would write a number smaller than ten. The last couple of pages of the questionnaire have some different kinds of questions. These will be explained as you come to them. Please fill this questionnaire out at home, and turn it in at the next meeting of your communication class. Thank you very much for your help. Sincerely, John T. Marlier Graduate Assistant Department of Communication 109 110 IF the distance between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how mannyalileos apart are: feeling that: ' THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE 0F PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos 111 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE EXISTENCE 0F PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. Galileos 112 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: ANY RAILROAD BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. Galileos 113 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. Galileos 114 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD N9I_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENTL and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos 115 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENL and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos 116 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how manngaIiIeos apart are: feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT'QR BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. and feeeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT'QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling: THE WAY YOU_FEEL ABOUT THE RAILROADS. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. Galileos 117 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how manngaliIeos apart are: feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. Galileos 118 Directions: Please indicate below any opinion about railroads which ou, personalIy, consider to be an ACCEPTABLE opinion by placing a one III in the space beside it. Indicate any opinion which ygp, personally, REJECT by placing a two (2) in the space beside it. Place a three (3) in the space beside any opinion which you NEITHER ACCEPT NOR REJECT. THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT OR BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Directions: Please estimate HOW MANY Galileos AWAY from your own opinion about railroads an opinion could be which would still be acceptable to you. Then estimate HOW MANY Galileos AWAY from your own opinion about railroads an Opinion would have to be before you would consider it UNACCEPTABLE to you. Remember: The difference, or distance between, feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF RAILROAD PASSENGER SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is I§N_(IO) Galileos. An opinion about railroads could be about Galileos from your own opinion about railroads and still be acceptable to you. An Opinion about railroads would have to be about Galileos from your own opinion about railroads before you would find it unacceptable and reject it. 119 Directions: Please indicate for each of the following questions the answer which best describes ygg; This information is needed to compare personal characteristics of the members of different groups participating in the project. Your name will be removed from it after the data are collected, and it is confidential. If for any reason you would rather not reveal any of the information requested, even under these conditions, then leave the question blank. Sex: Male Female Race: Black White Oriental American Indian Other or mixed Age: (Please supply, in years.) Hometown population: Less than 1,000 1,000 - 5,000 5,000 - 20,000 20,000 ~ 100,000 More than 100,000 Approximate family income: Less than $4,000 per year $4,000 to $7,000 per year $7,000 to $10,000 per year $10,000 to $20,000 per year More than $20,000 per year College Rank: Freshman Sophomore Junior Senior Graduate Grade Point Average: 0.00-2.00 APPENDIX D EXPERIMENTAL MESSAGES WITH VALUES OF MESSAGE STRUCTURE APPENDIX D EXPERIMENTAL MESSAGES WITH VALUES OF MESSAGE STRUCTURE Message 1 Message structure = 1.5957 ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION America has always operated on a capitalistic economic system. The railroads have thrived in the past in this country because maximum operating efficiency could be achieved as long as there was a maximum profit making incentive. In recent years, however, other forms of transportation have been cutting into railroad profits. Trucks, indi- rectly subsidized by government road building programs, compete with the railroads for freight hauling business. Airlines, operating out of municipal airports, compete for passenger business. In the face of these facts, it would only be fair for the government to loan money to the railroads to improve their facilities and services. In addition to this, however, government should encourage privately owned railroads to merge in order to increase their operating efficiency. Further, railroads should be allowed to discontinue unprofitable passenger service. At the same time, however, railroads must be controlled so that they don't get too bio. Some government regulation is necessary to keep them from becoming monopolistic. And the uneconomical lines that they abandon cannot be lines that are in the public interest. Some aspects of railroad transportation are vital to the national interest. While it is true that the taxpayer should not have to shoulder the financial burden of a high cost nationalized railway system, it is also true that the government must assure the continuation of rural and commuter passenger trains. Any financial 1055 involved with running these trains is worth it, because they are socially desirable. 120 121 Message 2 Message structure = 0.6181 ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION The government should help the railroads become more self suppor- ting so that they can be freed of the regulation that goes along with subsidies. Toward this end, laws should be passed which will make it possible for the railroads to make a profit on their own. The railroads should be protected by law from competitors in the transportation industry. The government builds airports for the airlines, which is unfair to the privately owned railroads that must compete with them. Government should tax truckers more heavily to help pay for highways and make trucks less competitive with the railroads. Ideally, the railroads should not be given any tax breaks that are not also given to truckers and airlines; but neither should truckers and airlines be given any tax breaks which are not also given to the railroads. The burden of passenger service losses should be lifted from the railroads through tax breaks and subsidies. The government should guarantee loans to the railroads to help them stay in business. Railroad freight ser- vice must be maintained in the national interest. To achieve this, Congress should revamp the strike handling machinery for the railroad industry. Railroad management should initiate and pursue plans sub- mitted to them by the Secretary of Transportation. Even brief railroad strikes bring layoffs in industry and cutbacks in production that must be avoided. Nbssage 3 Mossage structure = 0.8868 ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION Railroads should be privately owned, but regulated by the govern- ment. Railroads are important. The existence of railroad freight hauling service is good for the country. And commuter trains are an important form of mass transportation. The government should therefore provide tax incentives for the railroads to improve their equipment and services. Also, since railroad strikes are inconvenient for both shippers of freight and commuters, work rules and labor practices in the railroad industry should be modernized. The government can lend indirect financial support to the railroads by supplying barricades and safety equipment at all highway-railroad crossings, too. But direct support should only be given to those railroads which are in danger of bankruptcy. Railroads must be legulated to avoid monOpoIies, but that doesn't mean they should be owned by government. The only sensible stand on the railroad nationalization issue Is a middle-of-the-road stand. 122 Message 4 Message structure = 0.3544 ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION The government has an interest in transportation in this country which it must protect. The railroads of the nation should be consi- dered as vital national assets. It must be realized that central management of the nation's railroads would lead to greater operating efficiency. This means that if the government has a hand in running all of them, to make the system more sensible. In particular, the government should expand its hold on the passenger services of the nation's railroads. Of course, it should also see to it that the inves- tors who own the railroads are adequately compensated. But the advan- tages to government involvement with the railroads cannot be ignored. Govennment intervention to prevent railroad strikes, in particular, would minimize the disruption caused by railroad labor disputes. Legis- lators should act on permanent legislation to prevent railroad work stoppages. The President should be given more weapons to use in resolving railroad labor disputes, too, including binding arbitration. Unions should be allowed to strike against only those railroads that the Congress selects. And finally, railroad wage rates should be set by Congress. Message 5 Message structure = 0.8885 ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION If the government bought the nation's railroads from their private owners, the cost to the taxpayer would be great. Besides this, nation- alization of the railroads would lead to nationalization of other indus- tries and the collapse of our free enterprise system. And railroad services, both to freight shippers and to passengers, would not improve any If the railroads were government owned. The railroads should be nationalized only as a last, desperate resort. What the railroad indus- try really needs is less government interference, not more. The rail- roads should be permitted to earn a rate of return on investment suffi- cient to attract private capital. Railroads should not be expected to survive under government regulation that treats them like monopolies. They should be allowed to merge in order to increase operating efficiency. Railroads should be allowed to own and operate trucking companies and airlines. And labor laws imposed on the railroads by government, which are outdated and incompatible with modern technology, should be repealed. Railroad management should be allowed to streamline its work force. Railroad management should have the right to fire unnecessary workers to stay In business, and to automate their equipment, without labor laws stopping them. APPENDIX E POSTEST QUESTIONNAIRE FROM STUDY I WITH MESSAGE 1 APPENDIX E POSTEST QUESTIONNAIRE FROM STUDY I WITH MESSAGE 1 MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF COMMUNICATION ARTS EAST LANSING ° MI ' A882h DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNICATION Dear Participant: This questionnaire is a follow-up to the one you have already com- pleted. Many of the questions are the same, but not all of them. Once again we are asking you to tell us how different, or ”far a art” opin- ions about railroad nationalization are. If you recall, we measure the difference between opinions in Galileos. A Galileo is a unit of concep- tual distance, much as an inch is a unit of physical distance. The more different two opinions are, the more Galileos apart from each other they are. The difference, or distance between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS is TEN (IO) Galileos. Once again, you are supposed to tell us how many Galileos apart you think the opinions in the questionnaire are. In addition, you will be asked to tell us how far, or how many Galileos away, the opinion expressed by the message near the end of the questionnaire is from each of the other opinions in the questionnaire. Remember, the more different two opinions are, the bigger the number of Galileos apart they are. If you think that any of the pairs of opinions In the questionnaire are more different than the two opin- ions mentioned above, then you would write a number bigger than ten. If you think that they are not so different, then you would write a number smaller than ten. Please fill this questionnaire out at home and return it at the next meeting of your communication class. Once again, thank you for your help. Sincerely, John Marlier Graduate Assistant Department of Communication 123 124 IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERN- MENT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos 125 Remember: If the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how manngalileos apart are: feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT OR BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERN__ MENT. Galileos 126 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT OR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. Galileos 127 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. IS TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: ANY RAILROAD BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE PROFITABLE TRAINS WITH- OUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULT TAKE OVER ANY RAILTOAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT 95.3Y SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos 128 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERN: MENT. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT 95.3Y SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos 129 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERN- MENT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERN- MENT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERN- MENT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERN- MENT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT OR BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos 130 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how manngalileos apart are: feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD MOI INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos 131 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (l0) Galileos, then how many Galileos gpart are: feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling: THE WAY YOU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERN- MENT. and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling: THE WAY YOU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos 132 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF RAILROAD PASSENGER SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how manypGalileos apart are: feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHTS. and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT THE RAILROADS Galileos 133 Directions: Please read the message below, entitled ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION”, before continuing. The questions on the next two pages will ask you to estimate how far the opinion it expresses is from other Opinions, including your own. ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION America has always operated on a capitalistic economic system. The railroads have thrived in the past in this country because maximum Operating efficiency could be achieved as long as there was a maximum profit making incentive. In recent years, however, other forms of transportation have been cutting into railroad profits. Trucks, indi- rectly subsidized by government road building programs, compete with the railroads for freight hauling business. Airlines, Operating out of municipal airports, compete for passenger business. In the face of these facts, it would only be fair for the government to loan money to the railroads to improve their facilities and services. In addition to this, however, government should encourage privately owned railroads to merge in order to increase their operating efficiency. Further, railroads should be allowed to discontinue unprofitable passenger ser- vice. At the same time, however, railroads must be controlled so that they don't get too big. Some government regulation is necessary to keep them from becoming monopolistic. And the uneconomical lines that they abandon cannot be lines that are in the public interest. Some aspects of railroad transportation are vital to the national inter- est. While it is true that the taxpayer should not have to shoulder the financial burden of a high cost nationalized railway system, it is also true that the government must assure the continuation of rural and commuter passenger trains. Any financial loss involved with running these trains is worth it, because they are socially desirable. 134 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileosyppart are: feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION” ON THE PAGE BEFORE THIS. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION'I ON THE PAGE BEFORE THIS. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE "ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION” ON THE PAGE BEFORE THIS. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION“ ON THE PAGE BEFORE THIS. Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERN- MENT. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION'I ON THE PAGE BEFORE THIS. Galileos 135 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: and THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS is TEN (l0) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: and: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION. Galileos feeling that: and: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION. Galileos feeling that: and: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION. Galileos feeling that: and: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT OR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION. Galileos feeling: and: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION. Galileos APPENDIX F DESCRIPTION OF INITIAL INVOLVEMENT OPERATIONALIZATION APPENDIX F DESCRIPTION OF INITIAL INVOLVEMENT OPERATIONALIZATION Initially, involvement was operationalized by averaging the signed loadings of each individual (as a concept) on the last two (imaginary) factors of his hybrid space. This average loading (coordinate value) on imagi- nary factors was initially taken to reflect the extent to which the individual could not be represented in the aggre- gate real space as a point, i.e., high "size" in the space, or the extent to which he is ppinvolved in the tOpic. The reciprocal of this figure was therefore taken, to reflect the extent to which each individual was involved in the topic, and multiplied by one hundred to avoid indistin- quishably small figures. The mean value of this measure for the 352 cases in Study I was 15.994, with a range of 3,718. This Operationalization was utilized in all of the analyses reported in Appendix G, but failed to signifi- cantly predict dependent variable values in any of them. At that point in the analysis, it was realized that if the individual's coordinate values on these last two imaginary factors, which are signed numbers, were of approximately equal magnitudes but of opposite Sign, then their mean would not accurately refelct the magnitude of loadings on factors with imaginary eigen roots. Consequently, the Operationalization of involvement reported in the text was developed, and was utilized in all later analyses. 136 APPENDIX C SUMMARY OF LINEAR AND LOGARITHMIC REGRESSION ANALYSES FROM STUDY I APPENDIX G SUMMARY OF LINEAR AND LOGARITHMIC REGRESSION ANALYSES FROM STUDY I Prior to the analyses reported in the text, a number of regression analyses were performed, the results of which suggested that the analyses reported in the text would be revealing. In each of these analyses, the predictors were discrepancy, message structure, and the initial operation- alization of involvement described in Appendix F. In the first of these analyses the criterion variable was the magnitude of perceptual displacement, operational- ized as the geometric distance between the location of the message in the individual's hybrid space and the location of the message in the aggregate space of the individual's treatment group. Attitudinal discrepancy, or distance between the individual and the message, was a significant predictor (F = 1052.508, df. = l;350, p < .001), and accounted for seventy five percent of the variance in com- 2 = .750). Message struc- puted displacement (R = .866, r ture was also a significant predictor (F = 4.778, df. = 2;349, p < .029), but added less than one percent to the variance explained (multiple r2 = .754). The regression coefficients (Beta) for these variables were .881 and .060 respectively. Unadjusted slopes (B) were .778 and 2.547, and the constant was -4.278. Since the predicted relationship between discrepancy and displacement was quadratic, the log values of the 137 138 variables were also submitted to multiple regression analysis. Although the log of discrepancy was a statis- tically significant predictor (F = 151.904, df. = 1;350, p < .001), this model accounted for only thirty percent of the variance in the criterion (log Idisplacementl). Neither of the other predictors was significant. The results of these analyses indicated that the linear model was by far the better predictor of magnitude of perceptual displacement. Subsequent analyses were duplicated with log values, also, but with similar results. Consequently, these later log form analyses are not reported here. At this point a question arose to the correspondence between the values of the variables in the hybrid spaces and the real world. It must be remembers that subject re- sponses (raw data) had undergone several mathematical trans- formations in the generation of these spaces. As a check on the correspondence between the variables as operation- alized in the multi-dimensional spaces and the raw data, another value for displacement was computed and another regression analysis performed. The second measure of displacement was computed by subtracting the raw data subject report of his distance from the message from the figure for discrepancy computed in the multidimensional spaces. The mean value of this variable was 8.64, with a minimum of -282.70 and a maximum of 121.69. This figure for displacement was then submitted as the criterion variables, to regression analysis, with 139 discrepancy, message structure, and involvement as predic- tors. Discrepancy was a significant predictor (F = 46.640, df. = l;350, p <.001) but accounted for only twelve per- cent of the variance in displacement. Neither of the other predictors was individually significant, although message structure approached significance (p = .085). The absolute value of this second displacement mea- sure was then computed. This measure corresponded to the computed displacement measure within the space, since the Pythagorean computation has the effect of eliminating nega- tive numbers. The absolute value of the second displace- ment measure was then submitted to multiple regression analysis as the criterion, with the same three predictors as in previous analyses. Discrepancy computed wihin the space was once again a significant predictor (F = 804.889, df. = l;350, p < .001), and accounted for seventy percent of the variance in the criterion (R = .835, r2 = .697). Message structure was also a significant predictor (F = 9.692, df. = 2;349, p < .002), although it explained less than one percent additional variance (multiple r = .840, r2 = .705). Unadjusted slopes for discrepancy and message structure were .698 and 3.659, respectively. Betas were .859 for discrepancy and .094 for message structure. The constant was -8.061. Another regression analysis was run as a check on the possibility that the results of the above analysis might be artifactual, i.e., a result of having computed 140 values for the dependent variable by subtracting another variable from the independent variable. In this analysis the criterion variable was the raw data subject report of discrepancy, and the predictors were the same as in previous analyses. Once again discrepancy was a signifi- cant predictor (F = 837.523, df. = l;350, p < .001), accounting for seventy one percent of the variance (r = .840, r2 = .705). Message structure approached, but did not reach, significance as a predictor (F = 2.98, df. = 2;349, p < .085). The unadjusted slope (b) for discre- pancy was 1.309. Beta was .840, and the constant was -l6.020. On the basis of the similarity in the regression equations yielding predicted values for the first displace- ment measure and the absolute value of the second displace- ment measure, a working assumption was then adopted that there was a high correspondence between the values of displacement as computed within the hybrid spaces and derived from raw data. The low level of variance explained in the signed values of perceived displacement by linear predictors was taken to indicate both that values of per- ceived displacement were unlikely to be procedural arti- facts and that prediction of signed values of displacement would require a curvilinear function. Further, since log transformations of the independent variables had failed to yield high levels of variance explained, it was sus- pected that the necessary curve might be relatively complex. 141 Consequently, the analyses reported in the text, utilizing power transformations of discrepancy, message structure and the revised involvement Operationalization as predic- tors were performed. APPENDIX H QUESTIONNAIRE FROM STABILITY CHECK PRETEST, STUDY II APPENDIX H QUESTIONNAIRE FROM STABILITY CHECK PRETEST, STUDY II MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF COMMUNICATION ARTS AND SCIENCES EAST LANSING ° MI ° H882H DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNICATION Dear Participant: This questionnaire is the latest in a series associated with a study of opinions about railroad nationalization which was begun over two years ago. It asks you to report your own attitude about this topic, how important the topic is to you, and then to tell us how different (or in other words, how ”far apart”) some other Opinions about railroad nationalization are. Further down on this page you will see a statement about government ownership of railroads, followed by two scales. On the first of these scales, please indicate the extent to which you agree or disagree with the statement, by placing an X in the appropriate space on the scale. For example, if you strongly agree with the attitude expressed in the statement, you would place an X in the space nearest Agree, or in the first space: Agree 'X_: X: : : : : Disagree Similarly, if you agree with the statement, but with some reservation, you would place an X in the second or third space. If you neither agree nor disagree, or if you have no opinion on this subject, you would mark the fourth, or middle, space. On the second item, please indicate how important this topic is to you or how strongly you feel about it. For example, if you are person- ally involved with this issue, or care very much about it, you might mark the space nearest Important. On the other hand, if you have no experience or knowledge related to this topic, and don't really care about it one way or the other, you might mark the space nearest Unimpor- tant. The statement is: THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER OWNERSHIP AND OPERATION OF ALL RAILROADS IN THE UNITED STATES. Agree : : : : : : Disagree How Important is the topic to you? Important : : : : : : Unimportant Thank you for your responses. Now please go on to the next page, which explains the rest of the questionnaire. 142 143 The rest of the questionnaire asks you to tell us how different (or in other words, how "far apart”) opinions about railroad nationalization are. Difference between opinions can be measured in Galileos. A Gali- leo is a unit of conceptual distance, much as an inch is a unit of physi- cal distance. The more different two opinions are, the more Galileos apart from each other they are. To help you known how big a Galileo is, the difference, or distance between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS is TEN (l0) Galileos. In other words, these two opinions are ten Gali- leos ”apart”. You are supposed to tell us how many Galileos apart you think the opinions on the following pages of the questionnaire are. Remember, the more different two opinions are, the bigger the number of Galileos apart they are. If you think that any of the pairs of opinions in the questionnaire are more different than the two Opinions mentioned above, then you would write a number bigger than ten. If you think that they are not so different, then you would write a number smaller than ten. Please fill out the remainder of the questionnaire, and the attached Research Participation Credit Form, at home, and return them at the next meeting of your communication class. Thank you very much for your help. Sincerely, John Marlier Graduate Assistant Department of Communication 144 IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how manngalileos apart are: feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: ANY RAILROAD BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos 145 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. IS TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many_Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. Galileos 146 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT OR BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. Galileos 147 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: ANY RAILROAD BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE PROFITABLE TRAINS WITH- OUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROADS. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT OR BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos 148 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERN- MENT. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos 149 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (l0) Galileos, then how mapy Galileos apart are: feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT OR BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. Galileos 150 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL. and feeling that: ' THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT 9§_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. and feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NQI_INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT 9§.BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHT. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT OR BY SUBSIDIZING IT. Galileos APPENDIX I PRETEST QUESTIONNAIRE FROM STUDY II APPENDIX I PRETEST QUESTIONNAIRE FROM STUDY II Student No. MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF COMMUNICATION ARTS AND SCIENCES EAST LANSING ' MI ° 48829 DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNICATION Dear Participant: This questionnaire and the one you will pick up after you have completed this one are the latest in a series associated with a study of opinions about railroad nationalization which was begun over two years ago. This questionnaire asks you to tell us how different, or far away, some opin- ions about rarilroad nationalization are from your own opinion about this topic. It then asks you to indicate how important this topic is to you personally. Finally, it asks you to provide some factual information about yourself. This information will be kept confidential, and your name will not be attached to it. If you have any hesitancy about pro- viding it, just leave the question you would prefer not to answer blank. Much of the questionnaire consists of questions about how different (or in other words, how ”far apart") your Opinion and other opinions about railroad nationalization are. Differences in opinions can be measured in Galileos. A Galileo is a unit of conceptual distance, much as an inch is a unit of physical distance. The more different two opinions are, the more Galileos apart from each other they are. To help you know how big a Galileo is, the difference, or distance between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS is TEN (IO) Galileos. In other words, these two opinions are ten Galileos ”apart”. You are supposed to tell us how many Galileos apart your opinions and the opinions on the following pages of the questionnaire are. Remember, the more different two opinions are, the bigger the number of Galileos apart they are. If you think that any of the pairs of opinions in the questionnaire are more different than the two opinions mentioned above, then you would write a number bigger than ten. If you think that they are not so different, then you would write a number smaller than ten. 151 152 Before beginning to fill out the questionnaire, PLEASE BE SURE TO FILL IN YOUR STUDENT NUMBER AT THE TOP OF THIS PAGE. Then turn to the next page and begin. When you have finished, please return this question- naire and pick up the second one. Thank you. Sincerely, John Marlier Graduate Assistant Department of Communication 153 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS and feeling: THE WAY YOU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT and feeling: THE WAY YOU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT and feeling: THE WAY YOU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos 154 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF RAILROAD PASSENGER SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHTS. and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGUEATING IT g3 BY SUBSIDIZING IT. and feeling: THE WAY ygg FEEL ABOUT THE RAILROADS Galileos Directions: On the scale below, please indicate how important the tOpic of railroad nationalization is to ygg, personally, by placing an X in the appropriate space. For example, if the subject is very important to you or you have strong feelings about it, you would put an X in the space all the way to the left, closest to ”IMPORTANT". If you don't care at all about the topic, you would put an X in the right hand space. If you are somewhat interested in the topic, choose and appro- priate space in between. The subject of railroad nationalization is: IMPORTANT : : : : : : : : UNIMPORTANT to you? 155 Directions: Please indicate for each of the following questions the answer which best describes ygg, This information is needed to compare personal characteristics of the members of different groups participating in the project. Your name will be removed from it after the data are collected, and it is confidential. If for any reason you would rather not reveal any of the information requestioned, even under these conditions, then leave the question blank. Sex: Male Female Race: Black White Oriental American Indian Other or mixed Age (Please supply, in years) Hometown population: Less than 1,000 I,OOO-5,000 5,000-20,000 20,000-IO0,000 More than lO0,000 Approximate family income: less than $4,000 per year $4,000 to $7,000 per year $7,000 to $10,000 per year $l0,000 to $20,000 per year More than $20,000 per year College Rank: Freshmanf Sophomore Junior Senior Graduate Grade Point Average: 0.00-2.00 APPENDIX J POSTEST QUESTIONNAIRE FROM STUDY 11 WITH MESSAGE 1 APPENDIX J POSTEST QUESTIONNAIRE FROM STUDY 11 WITH MESSAGE 1 Student No. MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF COMMUNICATION ARTS AND SCIENCES EAST LANSING ' MI ° #8824 DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNICATION Dear Participant: BEFORE BEGINNING TO FILL OUT THIS QUESTIONNAIRE, PLEASE BE SURE TO FILL IN YOUR STUDENT NUMBER AT THE TOP OF THIS PAGE so that we will be able to match up this questionnaire later with the one you just turned in. Then turn to the next page and carefully read the message about railroad nationalization which appears there. When you have finished reading the message, turn to the next page and begin filling in the questions. Once, again, this questionnaire asks you to tell us how many Galileos apart your opinion, the opinion expressed by the message on the next page, and the other opinions on the following pages are. Remember, the more different two opinions are, the bigger the number of Galileos apart they are. If you think that any of the pairs of opinions in the questionnaire are more different than the pair which appears at the top of each page, then you would write a number bigger than ten. If you think that they are not so different, then you would write a number smaller than ten. When you have finished, you may turn in the questionnaire and leave. Thank you very much for your help. John Marlier Graduate Assistant Department of Communication 156 157 Diregéjons: Please read the message below, entitled ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION”, before continuing. The questions on the next two pages will asks to to estimate how far the opinion it expresses is from other opinions, including your own. ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION America has always Operated on a capitalistic economic system. The railroads have thrived in the past in this country because maximum operating efficiency could be achieved as long as there was a maximum profit making incentive. In recent years, however, other forms of transportation have been cutting into railroad profits. Trucks, indi- rectly subsidized by government road building programs, compete with the railroads for freight hauling business. Airlines, operating out of municipal airports, compete for passenger business. In the face of these facts, it would only be fair for the government to loan money to the railroads to improve their facilities and services. In addi- tion to this, however, government should encourage privately owned railroads to merge in order to increase their operating efficiency. Further, railroads should be allowed to discontinue unprofitable passenger service. At the same time, however, railroads must be con- tolled so that they don't get too big. Some government regulation is necessary to keep them from becoming monopolistic. And the uneconomi- cal lines that they abandon cannot be lines vital to the national inter- est. While it is true that the taxpayer should not have to shoulder the financial burden of a high cost nationalized railway system, it is also true that the government must assure the continuation of rural and commuter passenger trains. Any financial loss involved with running these trains is worth it, because they are socially desirable. 158 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL and feeling: THE WAY YQU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos 159 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF RAILROAD PASSENGER SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. Galileos feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED MORE FREEDOM IN SETTING PRICES FOR CARRYING FREIGHTS. and feeling: THE WAY YQU_FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. and feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT THE RAILROADS. Galileos 160 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION” ON THE PAGE BEFORE THIS. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION” ON THE PAGE BEFORE THIS. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE OVER ANY RAILROAD WHICH GOES BANKRUPT. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION” ON THE PAGE BEFORE THIS. Galileos feeling that: GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF RAILROAD RATES SHOULD BE LESS STRINGENT. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION” ON THE PAGE BEFORE THIS. Galileos feeling that: ANY RAILROADS BUILT IN THE FUTURE SHOULD BE OWNED BY THE GOVERNMENT. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION“ ON THE PAGE BEFORE THIS. Galileos 161 Remember: IF the difference between feeling that: THE EXISTENCE OF PASSENGER RAILROAD SERVICE IS GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY. and feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP THE RAILROADS IMPROVE THEIR EQUIPMENT SO THAT THEY CAN ATTRACT MORE PASSENGERS. is TEN (IO) Galileos, then how many Galileos apart are: feeling that: RAILROADS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DISCONTINUE UNPROFITABLE TRAINS WITHOUT GOVERNMENT APPROVAL and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION”. Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD OWN AND OPERATE ALL RAILROAD FACILITIES. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE “ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION.” Galileos feeling that: THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT INTERFERE IN ANY WAY WITH THE RAILROAD INDUSTRY, EITHER BY REGULATING IT QR_BY SUBSIDIZING IT. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE “ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION.” Galileos feeling: THE WAY YOU FEEL ABOUT RAILROADS. and: THE OPINION EXPRESSED BY THE MESSAGE ”ON RAILROAD NATIONALIZATION.” Galileos APPENDIX K TABLE A1 SUMMARY TABLE FOR REGRESSION WITH ATTITUDE CHANGE MAGNITUDES CONTROLLED FOR EFFECTS OF TESTING AS CRITERION 162 om..- omo. ooo. on. mmo.u mm..- mmm. m u4m2_m m_o. _oo. moo. moo. omo. moo. omu. uozoo>z_ mmo.o ohzmxm>oo>z_ _mo._ >uzmmm¢um_o _o_._ o>uzmmm¢um.o Nom.m manhuomhm mouz ch m onmmHHmu m< quHmmH mo mhummmm mom omqqomhzou meDHHzo<2 muzm<223m H< m4moo>2_ ammokuoth mo40>z. o>uzozoz onmmHHmu m< UzHHmmb mo mhummmm mom quqomezoo muz szuHm :HHZ onmmHMUmm mom mHmm<223m N< mqm