Cognitive-experiential self-theory proposes that individuals use two systems to process information, a highly conscious and analytical rational system and a preconscious, intuitive experiential system. These two systems operate in parallel and synchronistically but sometimes one may dominate the other. Findings from several experiments demonstrate that when information about threatening phenomena are presented in statistical or graphical form and require cognitive judgments, the rational system exerts primary influence in determining the nature of the judgment. Those who are skilled at and favor analytical thinking tend to minimize the seriousness of the threat. When exposed to emotionally evocative, anecdotal accounts of threatening events, both experientiality and rationality are related to the amount of apprehension individuals report. The experiential system may act to promote greater apprehension among highly rational individuals while at the same time dampen apprehension among low rationals.
Altheide, D.L. (2002). Creating fear: News and the construction of crisis . New York: Aldinede Gruyter.
2.
Bar-Hillel, M. (1980). The base-rate fallacy in probability judgments . Acta Pychologica, 44, 211-233.
3.
Berger, C.R. (1998). Processing quantitative data about risk and threat in news reports. Journal of Communication, 48, 87-106.
4.
Berger, C.R. (2000). Quantitative depictions of threatening trends in news reports: The scary world of frequency data. Human Communication Research, 26, 27-52.
5.
Berger, C.R. (2001). Making it worse than it is: Quantitative depictions of threatening trends in the news. Journal of Communication , 46, 655-677.
6.
Berger, C.R. (2002). Base-rate bingo: Ephemeral effects of population data on cognitive responses, apprehension, and perceived risk. Communication Research, 29, 99-124.
7.
Berger, C.R. (2005). Slippery slopes to apprehension: Rationality and graphical depictions of increasingly threatening trends. Communication Research, 32, 3-28.
8.
Berger, C.R., Johnson, J.T., & Lee, E.-J. (2003). Antidotes for anthrax anecdotes: The role of rationality and base-rate data in assuaging apprehension. Communication Research, 30, 198-223.
9.
Berger, C.R., Lee, E.-J., & Johnson, J.T. (2003). Gender, rationality, and base-rate explanations for increasing trends. Communication Research, 30, 737-765.
10.
Bradac, J.J. (1983). On generalizing cabbages, messages, kings, and several other things: The virtues of multiplicity. Human Communication Research, 9, 181-187.
11.
Brosius, H.-B. (1993). The effects of emotional pictures in television news. Communication Research, 20, 105-124.
12.
Chaiken, S. (1987). The heuristic model of persuasion. In M. P. Zanna, J. M. Olson , & C. P. Herman (Eds.), Social influence: The Ontario Symposium (Vol. 5, pp. 3-39). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
13.
Chen, S., & Chaiken, S. (1999). The heuristic-systematic model in its broader context. In S. Chaiken & Y. Trope (Eds.), Dual-process theories in social psychology (pp. 73-96). New York: Guilford.
14.
De Becker, G. (2002). Fear less: Real truth about risk, safety, and security in a time of terrorism. New York: Little, Brown & Company.
15.
Epstein, S. (1990). Cognitive-experiential self-theory. In L. Pervin (Ed.), Handbook of personality theory and research: Theory and research (pp. 165-192). New York: Guilford.
16.
Epstein, S. (1994). Integration of the cognitive and the psychodynamic unconscious. American Psychologist, 49, 709-724.
17.
Epstein, S. (2003). Cognitive-experiential self-theory of personality . In T. Millon & M. J. Lerner (Eds.), Handbook of psychology, Volume 5: Personality and social psychology (pp. 159-184). New York: John Wiley & Sons.
18.
Epstein, S., & Pacini, R. (1999). Some basic issues regarding dual-process theories from the perspective of cognitive-experiential self-theory. In S. Chaiken & Y. Trope (Eds.), Dual-process theories in social psychology (pp. 462-482). New York: Guilford.
19.
Epstein, S., Pacini, R., Denes-Raj, V., & Heier, H. (1996). Individual differences in intuitive-experiential and analytic-rational thinking styles. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71, 390-405.
20.
Fitch, M., Huston, A.C., & Wright, J.C. (1993). From television forms to genre schemata: Children's perception of television reality. In G. L. Berry & J. K. Asamen (Eds.), Children and television: Images in a changing sociocultural world (pp. 129—146). Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
21.
Funkhouser, H.G. (1937). Historical development of the graphical representation of statistical data. Osiris, 3, 269-404.
22.
Furedi, F. (1997). The culture of fear: Risk taking and the morality of low expectation. London: Cassell . Gerbner, G., & Gross, L. (1976). Living with television: The violence profile. Journal of Communication, 6, 223-230.
23.
Gigerenzer, G. (2000). Adaptive thinking: Rationality in the real world . Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
24.
Glassner, B. (1999). Culture of fear: Why Americans are afraid of the wrong things. New York: Basic Books .
25.
Goel, V., & Dolan, R. (2003). The modulation of reasoning by belief. Cognition, 87, B11-B22.
26.
Hammond, K.R. (2000). Judgments under stress. New York: Oxford University Press.
27.
Harris, R.J. (2004). A cognitive psychology of mass communication (4th ed.). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
28.
Hogarth, R.M. (2001). Educating intuition. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
29.
Hogarth, R.M. (2005). Deciding analytically or trusting your intuition: The advantages and disadvantages of analytic and intuitive thought. In T. Betsch & S. Haberstroh (Eds.), The routines of decision making (pp. 67-82). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
30.
Jackson, S.A. (1992). Message effects research: Principles of design and analysis. New York: Guilford Press.
31.
Kasperson, J.X., Kasperson, R.E., Pidegon, N., & Slovic, P. (2003). The social amplification of risk: Assessing fifteen years of research and theory. In N. Pidgeon , R. E. Kasperson, & P. Slovic (Eds.), The social amplification of risk (pp. 13-46). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
32.
Kelso, J.A.S., & Engstrom, D.A. (2006). The complementary nature . Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
33.
McLeod, C. (1996). Anxiety and cognitive process. In I. G. Sarason, G. R. Pierce , & B. R. Sarason (Eds.), Cognitive interference: Theories, methods and findings (pp. 47-76). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
34.
Morgan, M., & Shanahan, J. (1997). Two decades of cultivation research: An appraisal and meta-analysis. In B. R. Burleson (Ed.), Communication yearbook 20 (pp. 1-45). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
35.
Nickerson, R.S. (2004). Cognition and chance: The psychology of probabilistic reasoning. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
36.
Nisbett, R.E., & Ross, L. (1980). Human inference: Strategies and shortcomings of social judgment. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
37.
Norris, P., & Epstein, S. (2002). The investigation of some fundamental issues concerning rational-analytical and intuitive-experiential thinking styles with a short form of the rational-experiential inventory. Unpublished manuscript.
38.
Pacini, R., & Epstein, S. (1999). The relation of rational and experiential information processing styles to personality, basic beliefs, and the ratio-bias phenomenon . Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 76, 972-987.
39.
Petty, R.E., & Cacioppo, J.T. (1986). Communication and persuasion: Central and peripheral routes to persuasion. New York: Springer-Verlag.
40.
Petty, R.E., & Wegener, D.T. (1999). The elaboration likelihood model: Current status and controversies. In S. Chaiken & Y. Trope (Eds.), Dual-process theories in social psychology (pp. 41-72). New York: Guilford.
41.
Potter, W.J. (1988). Perceived reality in television effects research . Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media, 32, 159-174.
42.
Shrum, L.J. (1996). Psychological processes underlying cultivation effects: Further tests of construct accessibility. Human Communication Research, 22, 482-509.
43.
Shrum, L.J. (2001). Processing strategy moderates the cultivation effect. Human Communication Research, 27, 94-120.
44.
Siegel, M. (2005). False alarm: The truth about the epidemic of fear . Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.
45.
Strange, J.J. (2002). How fictional tales wag real-world beliefs: Models and mechanisms of narrative influence. In M. C. Green, J. J. Strange, & T. C. Brock (Eds.), Narrative impact: Social and cognitive foundations (pp. 287-313). Mahwah, NJ : Erlbaum.
46.
Strange, J.J., & Leung, C.C. (1999). How anecdotal accounts in news and in fiction can influence judgments of a social problem's urgency, causes, and cures. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 25, 436-449.
47.
Zillmann, D. (2002). Exemplification theory of media influence. In J. Bryant & D. Zillmann (Eds.), Media effects: Advances in theory and research (pp. 19-41). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
48.
Zillmann, D., & Brosius, H.-B. (2000). Exemplification in communication: The influence of case reports on the perception of issues. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
