Distrust and argumentation : how they influence the information-processing and persuasiveness of information

The main-question was how information processing and attitude formation differ under trust and distrust and how it is influenced by either a pro- or a contra-argumentation. It was predicted that distrusting people formulate counter-arguments by which they test information against alternative explanations. Further it was assumed that a contra-argumentation would be more persuasive due to a negativity bias. A 2(Source: trust/distrust) x 2(Argumentation: pro/contra) between-subject-designed experiment was conducted to test these hypotheses. The hypotheses could not be confirmed what probably was due to an unsuccessful source manipulation via subliminal priming. It is assumed that this failure stems from a preexisting attitude and therefore a confirmation bias. However, there was some support for the counter-arguments theory from an analysis of thought examples.