Activation Theory of Information Exposure

The activation theory of information exposure, developed by Lewis Donohew and Philip Palmgreen, explains individual differences in attention and continued exposure to mass and interpersonal messages. The theory treats messages as sources of stimulation and holds that their success or failure to attract and hold listeners, viewers, or readers is a function of both cognitive and biologically based individual needs. Successful messages are those possessing enough novelty, movement, color, intensity, and other such formal features to generate a level of activation that will maintain attention but not so high as to cause distraction. Persons with lower stimulation needs may turn away from stronger messages and be attracted instead to messages with lower levels of stimulation. Messages may possess enhanced persuasive power when they are able to attract and hold attention long enough for the content to be processed.

In its early form, the theory relied primarily on the cognitive attraction experienced by message receivers and their conscious decisions about what information to view or read. It has evolved to include more emphasis on formal, nonverbal [Page 12]features of message stimuli and out-of-awareness decisions to turn away from or stay exposed to certain information.

The theory has gone through a number of iterations since it was originally published in the 1980s. In one, Nancy Harrington, Derek Lane, and associates expanded the model to include need for cognition or thought, with John Caccioppo and Richard Petty's need-for-cognition scale as the measure. In another, Rick Zimmerman and associates broadened the studies to include other measures of appetitive and inhibitory systems and impulsive decision making. Some of the most recent research involves pilot functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies of brain responses to messages, which support the expectation that messages meeting novelty and sensation-generating criteria would generate arousal among higher risk takers in the more primal areas of the brain.

The activation theory of information exposure is deductive and nomological in nature. It is deductive in that it moves logically from general propositions to more specific ones. The theory is nomological in that it provides explanations of what causes the predicted responses across cases. The theory was developed in the tradition of use-inspired basic research, described as Pasteur's quadrant, which begins with a real-life problem and development of a general theory to account for underlying causes. On the basis of this explanation, a remedy is developed. In this instance, the problem was how to get people to expose themselves to information that could motivate them to accomplish a socially desirable goal such as becoming more competent citizens of a society. This entry explains the theory and provides a summary of supporting research.