Running Head: RESONANCE, RESISTANCE AND COUNTERVALENCE

While people often follow frames in opinion formation, they are also capable of resisting or even counteracting frames under certain circumstances. This paper stresses the importance of cognitive responses to framed messages and investigates the cognitive processes that lead people to follow or resist frames. It develops a schematic model of the frame-cognition interaction and specifies the conditions under which resistance and countervalent responses are expected. The paper experimentally tests the predictions measuring individuals’ spontaneous associations with framed messages (N=357). It finds that people counteract frames if these are recognized as unduly biased, and follow frames if their prior attitudes are too disparate to discover frame biases. Furthermore, stronger prior attitudes decrease the strength of successful framing effects, but increase the power of countervalent responses. Framed opinion formation is thus mediated by cognitive responses, which depend not merely on the frame or prior attitudes alone, but on a nonlinear interaction between both. Common wisdom in valence framing is straightforward: Positive frames lead to more positive evaluations, and negative frames to more negative ones. Outcomes are shaped by the frame, and the frame alone. However, this simple view has been called into question by several striking findings. Nelson and Oxley (1999) report that, under some circumstances, people are clearly able to resist the frame-embedded valence, even if they take over other components of the frame such as issue-contexts (see also Baden, 2008; Brewer, 2001; Gross, 2000; Zaller, 1992). People then stick to their previously formed judgments, rather than relying on frame-suggested valences. Chong and Druckman (2007b) have found evidence that frame valences can even backfire if they are not seen as convincing by the participants (see also Barker, 2005; Peffley & Hurwitz, 2007). Both kinds of findings point to the suspicion that the interaction between frame and cognition has not been investigated sufficiently in much framing research. In the interaction between pre-formed attitudes and the frame, either side may prevail, compromises may be forged, or entirely new insights may arise from connections so far unthought. It is the purpose of this study to develop and test a schematic model of the processes through which valenced frames interact with pre-formed attitude structures. Spelling out the roles of salient prior attitudes and densely integrated knowledge in framed cognition, it specifically aims to understand under which conditions framing is likely to fail, or even raise opposing responses. To assess these responses, this study records spontaneous associations raised by a frame and compares their valence to those suggested by the frame. It proposes an understanding that formulates resonant, resistant, and countervalent responses to framing as possible outcomes of the same fundamental cognitive processes. Deriving and experimentally testing specific expectations, the paper aims at contributing to a more inclusive view on framing effects. THEORY Kommentar [cb1]: Angle tow outlet, split in 2 §s Before we can understand what effects frames might have on cognitive processes, it is necessary to review what is known about the role of knowledge structures and attitudes in opinion formation. According to Zaller (1992; Zaller & Feldman, 1992), reported opinions are constructed ad hoc based on various underlying beliefs: Whenever people are asked to give their opinion, they scan their memory for relevant knowledge. Retrieving multiple beliefs, they weight these considerations by importance and then summarize the implied evaluative loadings (Nelson & Oxley, 1999). Variation in opinion can thus be explained by the sampling of beliefs entering the construction (see also Ajzen & Fishbein, 1980; 2000; Baden, 2008; Chong & Druckman, 2007a; Kuklinski & Hurley, 1996; Rhee, 1997; Zaller & Feldman, 1992). If considerations entailing positive evaluative implications prevail, the reported opinion will be positive; negatively charged considerations fuel negative opinions, and an even balance of valences implies an ambivalent response – or, possibly, no response at all (Brewer, 2001; Matthes, 2007; Zaller, 1992). What is less clear, however, is where these considerations come from. Early researchers in persuasion tended to assume that communicated messages contribute the bulk of considerations used by respondents (e.g., Hovland, Janis, & Kelley, 1953). With the decline of hypodermic theories, more subtle theories have taken over in communications. According to researchers in framing and agenda setting, communicated messages don’t necessarily provide the belief content underlying opinion responses. Rather they tap beliefs already stored in the respondent’s mind (see D. A. Scheufele, 1999 for a review). To the degree that people possess accessible beliefs about an issue, any reference to that issue activates the range of stored considerations and makes them likely to inform subsequent judgments. Framing scholars have emphasized that by selectively referring to specific contexts of referred-to issues, message frames can direct cognitive activation towards specific subsets of stored information (Shen, 2004). Beliefs resonating with the frame are likely to be retrieved, whereas mismatching considerations remain below conscious attention. In that sense, although ultimately people’s own beliefs feed reported opinion, frames decide to a large degree which subsets of a person’s knowledge comes to bear. Only recently has attention re-focused on some complications in this interaction between communicative and cognitive resources for opinion formation. Most obviously, Price and Tewksbury (1997) remind everyone that, to be tapped by frames, knowledge must be available in a respondent’s mind, which may not be the case. Elaborating in the same vein, de Vreese (2004b) and Slothuus (2008) note that frames might well provide new information and affect the respondent’s state of knowledge. Moreover, the same authors suggest that frames may induce people to revisit their knowledge, drawing new connections between beliefs already held (see also Baden, 2008; Peterson, 2004). In such cases, activated beliefs can no longer be unambiguously described as either stored considerations or message-proliferated information alone. From the interaction between both, new beliefs may emerge that are not simple functions of either ingredient. This observation is, of course, not new. In 1968, social psychologist Greenwald noted that the degree to which people received and remembered the contents of persuasive messages predicted reported opinion badly. According to Greenwald, people’s cognitions on an issue were dominated by thoughts rooted entirely or at least partly in respondent’s pre-existing attitude structures. People used the communicated information, but more often than not interpreted it in light of their own understandings (see also Petty, Brinol, & DeMarree, 2007). Following this perspective, it appears that messages do not directly form the bulk of opinion. Cognitive responses to communicated messages do (Brewer, 2001; Greenwald, 1968; Gross, 2000). Attitudes & Schemata When people react to information they perceive, they draw upon their schematic knowledge and attitude structures. Schemata and attitudes are, to a certain degree, two aspects of the same phenomenon. According to theorists in social cognition and cognitive psychology, a person’s beliefs are stored not as discrete units, but as a web of relations between all kinds of cognitive objects; all meaning is relational, as Holyoak and Thagard (1995) aptly summarized: One cannot believe “that X”, but only “that X relates to Y (in a particular way)” – i.e., X has property Y, causes effect Z, or a whole range of other semantic relations. The environment of a concept stored in the mind determines the range of meanings it can assume. Thus, the set of all beliefs a person holds can be represented by a large network of semantic relations between concepts. However, within the cognitive networks, there are subsets of relations that are frequently activated together; certain contexts of concept X make sense particularly if other contexts and concepts Y are also present. Such areas within the network are marked by a high density of connections: Very likely, the common neighbor concepts of X, which are usually activated together, are seen as semantically related as well. Such highly integrated subnetworks thus form relatively coherent knowledge structures grouping beliefs held to be strongly related: They build cognitive schemata that can be retrieved and act as wholes (B. Scheufele, 2004; van Dijk & Kintsch, 1983; Zaller, 1992). Since beliefs often carry evaluative implications (Ajzen & Fishbein, 2000), such schemata cannot only be thought of as coherent knowledge structures, but also as relatively stable and readily applicable resources of valenced beliefs for opinion formation: attitudes. Within schemata, beliefs are frequently considered together, enabling and motivating people to resolve evaluative dissonances (Visser, Holbrook, & Krosnick, 2007). Thus, schematically organized beliefs will yield highly coherent and strong judgments. For enhanced clarity, attitudes will be referred to in this paper as the evaluative loads contributed by the beliefs of coherent schematic structures, rather than potentially all beliefs pertaining to an object. While evaluative implications tend to be relatively coherent within schemata, different schemata about the same object – also neighboring ones – may carry quite different valences. Thus, whenever people possess multiple schemata about an object, this implies that they hold multiple attitudes towards it, which may (and often will, see Zaller & Feldman, 1992) be countervalent (de Liver, van der Pligt, & Wigboldus, 2007; Gamson & Modigliani, 1987; Zaller &