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Abstract

Experiments involving choice tasks were conducted to test the potential utility of word associations in constructing assertions and messages that are cogent in the sense that they actually bear on the interests and experiences of a particular audience. Similarity judgment tasks, which were based on verbal association dat previously obtained from similar groups, were administered to U. S. and Korean student samples. The results supported the hypothesis that associations previously scoring higher by one cultural group would be judged "more similar, " "more related, " by a group from the same culture. In another experiment administered only to the Korean group, higherscoring associations and their respective communication themes were combined into assertions. It was assumed that assertions based on strong associative linkages would be judged more meaningful by groups similar to the one on which the original data were obtained. The cogency of these association-based assertions was compared in choice tasks with that of assertions constructed on the same themes by two cultural experts on Korea; the association-based assertions were found to be significantly more meaningful.

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Designing and Testing Cogent Communications

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