Enhancing Smoking Risk Communications: The Influence of Need for Cognition

Objectives: One way to enhance the impact of smoking health risk messages may be to tailor their content to individual difference factors such as need for cognition (NFC). In this study, we examined how NFC influenced responses to different smoking risk messages. Outcomes included knowledge, risk perceptions, and behavioral expectations related to quitting smoking. Methods: We randomized 402 participants to one of 4 different risk message sets that were manipulated in terms of emotionality and framing in a 2x2 design: (1) factual gain-framed, (2) factual loss-framed, (3) emotional gain-framed, and (4) emotional loss-framed. Results: Statistically significant main effects emerged for NFC and emotionality. For certain risk perceptions, those with lower NFC reported greater perceived risk in response to emotional messages and lower risk in response to factual messages; those with higher NFC showed an opposite pattern. Similarly, those with lower NFC reported greater risk in response to gain-framed messages and lower risk in response to loss-framed messages; the opposite pattern emerged for those lower in NFC. Conclusions: Findings highlight the importance of an individual difference variable in influencing the impact of different types of smoking risk messages.