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The inhibitory effect of a distressing anti-smoking message on risk perceptions in smokers

We tested the hypothesis that people strategically reduce their estimates of personal risk when they are confronted with a potentially distressing health message. One hundred and two smokers were exposed to either an anti-smoking message presented using an imagery designed to maximize emotional distress, or the same message presented using less distressing images. We found lower personal risk estimates in the distressing image message condition. A path analysis showed that this effect may be mediated by a tendency to make more negative evaluations of the distressing message. Participants also spent less time attending to the distressing message, but this did not mediate the effects of the experimental manipulation. We suggest that these lowered risk estimates are partly the outcome of defensive processes activated by distress associated with perceptions of personal vulnerability.