Why is it important to use normative criteria when you manipulate argument quality in a study?

What is it about?

In experimental research on the persuasion process, argument quality manipulations are used to assess whether participants have been paying attention to the arguments or not. If they do, strong argument should lead to more persuasion whereas weak arguments should lead to less persuasion. In this paper, we carefully look at how researchers have manipulated argument quality and find that whereas strong arguments are indeed strong from a normative perspective, the weak arguments are often not arguments at all or are even counterarguments. As a result, the messages containing weak argument are highly unnatural. In this paper, we not only show what the problem is, but also provide guidelines for a more sound manipulation of argument quality.

Featured Image

Why is it important?

All kinds of conclusions are drawn about the importance of argument quality for the persuasion process whereas these conclusions are often based upon flawed operationalizations of argument quality. Comparing the persuasive impact of a message with strong arguments to that of a message without arguments or even counter arguments has little to say about the nature of the persuasion process nor does it enable one to provide evidence-based advice to message designers. To truly understand what central or systematic processing entails, theoretically informed manipulations of argument quality are needed.

Perspectives