Some Key Concepts in Public Opinion and Persuasion

Public Opinion -- Public opinion has at least three distinct meanings:

• A summary of the collective opinions of individuals in a group.

• What public opinion polls measure.
  A poll is a survey of a population that measures opinions. Polls are usually based upon probability sampling, in which a small subgroup is systematically chosen to represent the characteristics of the group as a whole. To the extent that polls are reliable and valid, the results are said to reflect underlying attitudes and can predict the likely actions of the population as a whole. Changes in poll and survey measures are ways to gauge shifts or trends in public opinion, and to measure the effectiveness of public relations campaigns.

• Process by which groups and individuals form and change attitudes and express opinions.
  Constructionism -- People take action based upon what they believe to be true, or their own world view of reality. This social reality is based upon the "pictures inside our heads" (Walter Lippmann, 1922) versus the objectivist conditions that might exist in society. People construct beliefs and attitudes about social reality through the consumption of media messages, interaction with other individuals, and the integration of new ideas with their own cultural and individual experience. This idea explains why individuals with different beliefs and values can look at the same situation and draw quite different conclusions.

Opinion -- The public expression of an attitude. A proxy for understanding people's knowledge and feelings. Involves people volunteering information or asking them questions, rather than observing or obtaining reports on their behavior.

Attitude -- Predisposition toward a particular object, person or issue, based upon beliefs and values. Subject to change in a person's goals, attitude is a reasonably accurate predictor of human actions.

Belief -- Information or fact that an individual thinks to be true. Often equated to knowledge stored in memory.

Value -- Individual or societal-based judgments about what is important or unimportant, good or bad, pleasurable or unpleasurable, desirable or undesirable. Values often evoke a strong emotional (affective) response.

Public -- A group of individuals who are affected by the actions of organization, e.g. customers/ consumers, investors, donors, employees or the community at large. Also known as "stakeholders."

Members of a public:

• recognize their stake in an organization or issue,
• communicate with others about the issue, and
• can organize to take action.

• crowd -- a large group of people who act in concert in a spontaneous and unplanned manner, usually based upon emotional contagion rather than discussion.
• mass -- a large heterogenous group of people (such as found in a society or nation), but are only loosely bound together by some common interest and take action as individuals on their own behalf.
• general public -- the collection of all individuals (and thus all publics) within a particular society, closely resembling a mass. A concept of limited value in public relations because people are not equally affected by the actions of an organization and are not equally involved in the processes of public opinion.
• segment, such as market segment -- a group that shares a common demographic or other characteristic and, as a result, its members are likely to behave as individuals in similar ways.
• community, a group of people who share a common identity based on upon common experience, such as living in the same geographic place or sharing the same symbols. Publics evolve from communities.
• audience -- the recipients of communications messages. Publics are prospective audiences for public relations messages.

  Publics can be categorized variously as: internal v. external; primary v. secondary v. tertiary; active v. passive; nonpublics, latent, aware or active; high involvement v. low involvement.

Issue -- A topic that serves as the basis for discussion among members of a public.

Issues often involve a dispute between two or more publics, usually rooted in differences in their perceptions of reality. Issues often result in controversy or conflict, and can involve: organized political action by various groups, coverage by media, and involvement by public policy makers. Many issues involve disagreements over the allocation or use of resources and/or the consequences for the rights of others.

Issues management, as a specialty field, involves monitoring the concerns of various publics and anticipating conflicts that might involve an organization. As advocates of a particular position, public relations practitioners are direct participants in the process.

Involvement -- The degree to which a particular topic (product, person, organization, issue) has personal relevance or consequences for an individual.

Involvement can be:
• situational -- when a person must take action, such as making a purchase, or
• enduring -- the person has a long-term interest in a product, activity, cause, etc.

Involvement is a significant explanatory factor that explains why individuals and groups construct social reality differently, hold different opinions, and become involved politically in issues. Although involvement levels vary on a continuum, we frequently talk about this variable in terms of high involvement versus low involvement.

Based on Ray, et al. (1973)                   


 High Involvement           Low Involvement            Radical    
  Learning Model                 Model              Behavioralism
                                                        Model
______________________     _____________________  ____________________ 


  Knowledge Gain             Create, Change          Force Change
    COGNITIVE                   Feelings             in Actions
                                AFFECTIVE               CONATIVE
        ¦                                      
                                   ¦                      ¦
  Change Feelings             Knowledge Gain
 (Interest, Desire)             COGNITIVE              Knowledge
    AFFECTIVE                                            Gain     
                                   ¦                    COGNITIVE
        ¦                           
                                 Actions                  ¦
     Actions                     CONATIVE  
     CONATIVE                                         Form, Change
                                                        Feelings


Alternative Strategies:

By sender:

  Supply information       Supply minimal           Recommend policy
                           information, appeal      changes or actions        
                           to emotion through       by organization
                           symbols, other devices                 
       
  Rational appeals         Emotional, fear appeals  Explanation not  
                                                    always essential
.
.
.
.            
By receiver:                            

  Focus on arguments       Focus on heuristic       Observe own behavior
                           cues to simplify judg-   (learn by doing)
                           ments.  Examples: 
                           celebrity status of an
                           endorser, source       
                           credibility or expertise,
                           views of the majority.