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Methodological Artifact or Persistent Bias?

Testing the Robustness of the Third-Person and Reverse Third-Person Effects for Alcohol Messages

School of Journalism and Communication at Ohio State University

Kaiya Liu

School of Journalism and Communication at Ohio State University

Michael Myser

San Francisco

Differences in perceived influences of positive and negative media messages were examined in three experiments with methodological variations. In the first experiment, when the contrast between self and others was clearly highlighted within the framework of a within-subject design, both the third-person effect and the reverse third-person effect were significant. In Experiment 2, when the perceived effect on self and others was evaluated using a between-subjects design, the third-person effect continued to persist, whereas the reverse third-person effect was not evident. The results from Experiment 2 were replicated in Experiment 3 under three levels of accountability. The third-person bias continued to persist even after participants were briefed about the self-serving motivation to appear better than others. These results suggest that the third-person phenomenon is not merely a methodological artifact but a persistent social judgment bias that cannot be easily neutralized, whereas the reverse third-person effect appears to be less robust.

Key Words: third-person media effect • first-person media effect • reverse third-person media effect • social judgment bias • social comparison • alcohol messages

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