Download Theoretical Models for Public Relations Campaigns

Theoretical Models for Public
Relations Campaigns
James K. VanLeuven
Colorado State University
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
1
Public relations campaigns

Public relations campaigns are a blueprint for
achieving desired business and
communications objectives. The first critical
step in campaign creation is pinpointing what
the agency/organization hopes to achieve as
an end result. Does the business wish to
generate awareness of a new program or
product? Position itself as an industry expert
and resource? Change attitudes and
opinions? -Lovell Public Relations
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
2
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
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Communication and social science theories
serve as frameworks guiding public
relations campaign decisions
Each of the five theories suggests a
different sequence or hierarchy of effects
leading to a campaign's focal objective
Thus, the theoretical models outlined here
may be utilized to help set campaign
objectives and to determine strategy
including message design and channel use
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
3
PERSUASION/LEARNING
EFFECTS

The first two models are grounded in social
psychology's learning effects tradition.
Typically, public relations planners follow the
persuasion model derived from instrumental
learning and holding that knowledge,
attitude, and behavior change take place in a
more-or-less stepwise manner.
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
4
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The central notion behind instrumental
learning is that an opinion or attitude
becomes habitual because its overt
expressions or internal rehearsal is followed
by the experience or anticipation of positive
reinforcement.
This process, as developed in Hovland's Yale
Communication Program, progresses in four
stages from awareness to comprehension, to
acceptance, and finally, retention ( Hovland,
Janis, & Kelly 1953).
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
5

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McGuire approach ( 1981) to persuasion and
campaign planning follows a similar orientation.
Implications For Campaign Objectives
Implicit in the persuasion/learning effects model and
many public relations campaigns is the assumption
that the likelihood of attaining an array of campaign
objectives tapers off quickly following awareness.
Perhaps 70 percent of the audience will achieve
awareness, but progressively fewer will gain specific
knowledge, change opinions, etc.
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
6
Generate awareness and
interest
Implications for Campaign Strategies
Strategies geared to the persuasion/learning
effects model focus on conditions for
optimizing impacts in the early stages of a
change process. Strategy and programming
decisions emphasize techniques for creating
awareness and enhancing knowledge gain.

Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
7
SOCIAL LEARNING MODEL

The social learning model offers a more
complex and variegated approach
pegged to sustained behavioral change
based on careful synchronization of
media publicity and interpersonal
support programs. It is geared more to
education and training than to
persuasion
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
8
Certain Behaviour  attitude
change

The theory, holds that there is a continuous,
reciprocal interaction among a person's behavior,
events going on inside the person (thoughts,
emotional reactions, expectations), and the
environmental consequences of that behavior. The
likelihood that a specific behavior will occur is
determined by the consequences the person expects
will follow the performance of that behavior. The
more positive and rewarding the
consequences, the more likely the behavior is
to occur ( McAlister, 1981)
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
9


Implications for Campaign Objectives
Campaign planners guided by social learning
theory generally set separate objectives for each
target audience. Those objectives include
everything from awareness through sustained
behavioral change, although the emphasis given
each objective is calibrated to the ease with
which particular groups or target audience
members may attain each objective.
Implications for Campaign Strategies
The complexities of social learning theory
require separate overall strategies and often
completely distinct message designs and
channel uses for each target audience.
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
10
LOW-INVOLVEMENT
MODEL

The low-involvement model developed from
the advertising and marketing literature and
is well suited to short-term promotions and
awareness campaigns. It holds that the
media may induce action-taking without
necessarily affecting parallel cognitive and
attitudinal change. This happens because
relatively inconsequential behaviors are not
dependent on great amounts of knowledge or
reconciliation with existing attitudes
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
11

Flay ( 1986) wrote that the lowinvolvement model is most likely to be
successful when there is little objective
difference between the alternative or
when the audience does not care about
the magnitude of difference between
alternatives. E.g. “If you drink, don't drive-if you drive, don't drink”
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
12
Not too much thinking
required

Clearly, the low-involvement sequence
of effects fits situations not requiring
audience members to stop and think
about the issue. The sequence of
effects presumed by the model moves
from simple awareness to behavioral
change, and then, perhaps, to
attitudinal change.
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
13
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Implications for Campaign Objectives
The low-involvement model moves from
awareness to behavior change by minimizing the
number of steps in between. However, it is often
necessary to have at least one intermediate
objective (e.g., knowledge gain) in order to
provide reason or justification for immediate
action
Implications for Campaign Strategies
By relying on awareness to induce behavior, the
low-involvement strategy almost always means
a short, but memorable, message repeated very
often through mass media channels
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
14
COGNITIVE CONSISTENCY
MODEL
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The cognitive consistency model is a particularly
useful framework when dealing with tension
reduction situations including crisis communication,
certain issue management problems, negotiations
and other conditions where imposed behaviors and
decisions demand new knowledge and attitude
change before they can be generally accepted. It is
also a useful planning framework in situations where
new knowledge counters existing beliefs and
attitudes
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
15

Cognitive strategies for reconciling
inconsistencies include: (a) revoking or
attempting to revoke the decision or
behavior, (b) lowering the importance
of the decision, (c) increasing the
ambiguity or cognitive overlap between
the discrepant ideas, and (d) adding
supportive beliefs to change the ratio of
dissonant to consonant elements.
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
16
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Implications for Campaign Objectives
Focal objectives for campaigns based on the
consistency model involve increasing the salience or
certain target beliefs along with adding specific new
beliefs
Implications for Campaign Strategy
Message style may be just as important as actual
message construction in situations where consistency
is being restored. That is, the imposed behavior must
be made to appear compatible with existing
attitudes, values, and lifestyles. This means that
more attention must go to the social context in which
the message is presented
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
17
VALUE CHANGE

A more recent campaign planning
model builds on Rokeach ( 1979) theory
of value change and is adaptable to
relatively personal and intense issues
that challenge the self-esteem of those
affected by the issue (such as drug and
alcohol abusers)
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
18
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Value change takes place in at least two ways. The
first, following consistency logic holds that value
change occurs when an inconsistency is invoked
between a high-ranking personal value and other
knowledge, attitudes, values, or behavior. Once
made known, the value inconsistency is resolved by
first increasing the salience of a target value and
then by readjusting knowledge, attitudes, and
behaviors in line with the target value. Thus, the
sequence of effects moves from value inducement (a
cognitive restructuring process) to attitudinal and
related behavioral change
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
19

Implications for Campaign
Objectives
Because value change is a generalized
cognitive restructuring process, the
scope of its effects span to cognitive,
attitudinal, and behavior change.
Emphasis, however, is on making
specific beliefs or issue stands
consistent with more generalized values
or ideals
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
20

Implications for Campaign Strategies
The value change process suggests several message
strategies. Beliefs may be added to provide a new
context for a particular value in question. Or,
planners might strengthen the instrumental
relationship between a strongly held value and its
application to the present situation. As well, attitudes
held by diverse target publics are often mobilized
when the consequences of a problem are cast in
terms of a more universally accepted value. A new
value may also be injected into a situation to hedge
existing values. When a new value is placed
alongside an existing one, audience members may be
forced to consider both (thereby at least partially
neutralizing their previously entrenched positions)
Meenakshi
Upadhyay,Academician,UDCJ
21