The PR BlogMedia & PsychologyBehavioural PsychologyThe Amplification Hypothesis: Counter Extreme Arguments
Media & PsychologyBehavioural Psychology

The Amplification Hypothesis: Counter Extreme Arguments

Why you shouldn't fight fire with fire when arguing.

Jerry Silfwer
by Jerry Silfwer

Cover photo: @jerrysilfwer

2 min.

The amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is tells us about atti­tude certainty.

You want to con­vince your audi­ence that you are right and the oth­er side is wrong.

You think that by using strong argu­ments, you will be able to sway people’s opin­ions. But it does­n’t work that way.

How can we counter extreme positions?

Here goes:

Table of Contents 

The Power of Attitude Polarisation

The amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is (some­times called atti­tude polar­isa­tion) is a well-known psy­cho­lo­gic­al effect.

Related the­or­ies are rein­force­ment the­ory, select­ive expos­ure the­ory, and sub­ject­ive val­id­a­tion.

Attitude polar­iz­a­tion occurs when indi­vidu­als with strong atti­tudes on a par­tic­u­lar issue are con­fron­ted with evid­ence or argu­ments that con­tra­dict their beliefs. Rather than modi­fy­ing their atti­tudes, they become even more entrenched in their beliefs, lead­ing to increased atti­tude cer­tainty. 1D. K. Freedheim (Ed.) History of psy­cho­logy. Vol. 1 of I. Weiner (Ed.) Comprehensive Handbook of Psychology. New York: Wiley.

The effect is believed to be due to sev­er­al psy­cho­lo­gic­al pro­cesses, such as con­firm­a­tion bias, which is the tend­ency to seek out and inter­pret inform­a­tion in a way that sup­ports our pre-exist­ing beliefs, and the back­fire effect, which is the tend­ency for people to become more firmly attached to their beliefs when they are challenged. 

Displaying uncer­tainty about an atti­tude, on the oth­er hand, can lead to atti­tude change because it under­mines the indi­vidu­al’s con­fid­ence in their beliefs and makes them more open to con­sid­er­ing altern­at­ive perspectives.

Using the Amplification Hypothesis in PR

The Amplification Hypothesis

It’s com­mon to find that coun­ter­ar­gu­ments strengthen exist­ing beliefs instead of weak­en­ing them. 

  • The harder you attack someone verbally, the more you con­vince them of their belief, not yours.

The phe­nomen­on is known as the amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is, where dis­play­ing cer­tainty about an atti­tude when talk­ing with anoth­er per­son increases and hardens that attitude.

“Across exper­i­ments, it is demon­strated that increas­ing atti­tude cer­tainty strengthens atti­tudes (e.g., increases their res­ist­ance to per­sua­sion) when atti­tudes are uni­valent but weak­ens atti­tudes (e.g., decreases their res­ist­ance to per­sua­sion) when atti­tudes are ambi­val­ent. These res­ults are con­sist­ent with the amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is.“
Source: A new look at the con­sequences of atti­tude cer­tainty: The amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is 2Clarkson, J. J., Tormala, Z. L., & Rucker, D. D. (2008). A new look at the con­sequences of atti­tude cer­tainty: The amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, … Continue read­ing

How does the amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is work? 

In a threat­en­ing situ­ation or emer­gency, we resort to the prim­al (fast­est) part of the brain and sur­viv­al instincts (fight, flight and freeze). 3Surviving the Storm: Understanding the Nature of Attacks held at Animal Care Expo, 2011 in Orlando, FL.

  • Dichotomous think­ing. This think­ing style is at the heart of rad­ic­al move­ments and fun­da­ment­al­ism. Even people who exer­cise abstract think­ing, logic, reas­on, and the abil­ity to recog­nize com­plex issues can resort to this think­ing style when threatened. 4See also con­ver­sion the­ory.
  • Egocentric think­ing. People who demon­strate non-ego­centric think­ing in many areas can also use this think­ing style under stress. When a tar­get is labelled an enemy, cog­nit­ive steps jus­ti­fy viol­ent beha­viour and pre­vent altru­ism and empathy. 5Beck (1999): Homogenization, Dehumanization and Demonization.
  • Distorted think­ing. We tend to ignore details in our envir­on­ments that do not sup­port our think­ing and beliefs. 6See also cog­nit­ive dis­son­ance.

Establishing com­mon ground and exhib­it­ing empathy demon­strates a genu­ine under­stand­ing of their per­spect­ive, fos­ter­ing trust and open­ness to your ideas. Conversely, if your object­ive is to deflect per­suas­ive attempts, a stra­tegic mis­match of atti­tudes can serve as a power­ful countermeasure.

Persuade

To per­suade, align your atti­tude with the tar­get. Otherwise, you will only act to cre­ate resistance.

Provoke

To put off a per­suader, mis­match their atti­tudes. When they are logic­al, be emo­tion­al, and vice versa. 

Read also: The Amplification Hypothesis: How To Counter Extreme Positions

Please sup­port my blog by shar­ing it with oth­er PR- and com­mu­nic­a­tion pro­fes­sion­als. For ques­tions or PR sup­port, con­tact me via jerry@​spinfactory.​com.

PR Resource: Conversion Theory

The Conversion Theory: The Misrepresented Minority

The dis­pro­por­tion­al power of minor­it­ies is known as the con­ver­sion the­ory.

How does it work?

The social cost of hold­ing a dif­fer­ent view than the major­ity is high. This increased cost explains why minor­it­ies often hold their opin­ions more firmly. It takes determ­in­a­tion to go against the norm. 7Moscovici, S. (1980). Toward a the­ory of con­ver­sion beha­viour. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 13, 209 – 239. New York: Academic Press.

In con­trast, many major­ity mem­bers don’t hold their opin­ions so firmly. They might belong to the major­ity for no oth­er reas­on than that every­one else seems to be. 8Chryssochoou, X. and Volpato, C. (2004). Social Influence and the Power of Minorities: An Analysis of the Communist Manifesto, Social Justice Research, 17, 4, 357 – 388.

“In groups, the minor­ity can have a dis­pro­por­tion­ate effect, con­vert­ing many ‘major­ity’ mem­bers to their own cause. This is because many major­ity group mem­bers are not strong believ­ers in its cause. They may be simply going along because it seems easi­er or that there is no real altern­at­ive. They may also have become dis­il­lu­sioned with the group pur­pose, pro­cess, or lead­er­ship and are seek­ing a viable altern­at­ive.”
Source: changingminds.org

According to con­ver­sion the­ory, while major­it­ies often claim norm­at­ive social influ­ence, minor­it­ies strive for eth­ic­al high ground. 

Given the power of norm­at­ive social influ­ence, minor­it­ies must stick togeth­er in tight-knit groups that can verb­al­ise the same mes­sage repeatedly.

Read also: Conversion Theory: The Disproportionate Influence of Minorities

PR Resource: Spiral of Silence

The Spiral of Silence

Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann - Spiral of Silence - Doctor Spin - The PR Blog
Professor Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann (1916−2010).

Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann’s well-doc­u­mented the­ory on the spir­al of silence (1974) explains why the fear of isol­a­tion due to peer exclu­sion will pres­sure pub­lics to silence their opinions.

Rather than risk­ing social isol­a­tion, many choose silence over express­ing their genu­ine opinions.

“To the indi­vidu­al, not isol­at­ing him­self is more import­ant than his own judge­ment. […] This is the point where the indi­vidu­al is vul­ner­able; this is where social groups can pun­ish him for fail­ing to toe the line.”
— Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann

As the dom­in­ant coali­tion gets to stand unop­posed, they push the con­fines of what’s accept­able down a nar­row­er and nar­row­er fun­nel (see also the opin­ion cor­ridor).

“The smart way to keep people pass­ive and obed­i­ent is to strictly lim­it the spec­trum of accept­able opin­ion, but allow very lively debate with­in that spec­trum — even encour­age the more crit­ic­al and dis­sid­ent views. That gives people the sense that there’s free think­ing going on, while all the time the pre­sup­pos­i­tions of the sys­tem are being rein­forced by the lim­its put on the range of the debate.”
— Noam Chomsky

Read also: The Spiral of Silence

ANNOTATIONS
ANNOTATIONS
1 D. K. Freedheim (Ed.) History of psy­cho­logy. Vol. 1 of I. Weiner (Ed.) Comprehensive Handbook of Psychology. New York: Wiley.
2 Clarkson, J. J., Tormala, Z. L., & Rucker, D. D. (2008). A new look at the con­sequences of atti­tude cer­tainty: The amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95(4), 810 – 825. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0013192
3 Surviving the Storm: Understanding the Nature of Attacks held at Animal Care Expo, 2011 in Orlando, FL.
4 See also con­ver­sion the­ory.
5 Beck (1999): Homogenization, Dehumanization and Demonization.
6 See also cog­nit­ive dis­son­ance.
7 Moscovici, S. (1980). Toward a the­ory of con­ver­sion beha­viour. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 13, 209 – 239. New York: Academic Press.
8 Chryssochoou, X. and Volpato, C. (2004). Social Influence and the Power of Minorities: An Analysis of the Communist Manifesto, Social Justice Research, 17, 4, 357 – 388.
Jerry Silfwer
Jerry Silfwerhttps://doctorspin.net/
Jerry Silfwer, alias Doctor Spin, is an awarded senior adviser specialising in public relations and digital strategy. Currently CEO at KIX Index and Spin Factory. Before that, he worked at Kaufmann, Whispr Group, Springtime PR, and Spotlight PR. Based in Stockholm, Sweden.

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