A Meta-Analysis of Fear Appeals: Implications for Effective Public Health Campaigns

By Kim Witte, Mike Allen. Health Education & Behavior, 2000

3,224 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Subfields: Applied Psychology, Literature and Literary Theory, Social Psychology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/5264fb9d404774229af93dad1e05c2254b39eae8

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Citations in the corpus

Appealing to fear: A Meta-Analysis of Fear Appeal Effectiveness and Theories (2015, background): “The linear and curvilinear models have been tested in prior meta-analyses, and the linear model has consistently been supported by existing data, whereas the curvilinear model has not (e.g., Witte & Allen, 2000).”
Risk Perceptions and Psychological Effects During the Italian COVID-19 Emergency (2020, background): “Witte and Allen’s meta-analysis (Witte and Allen, 2000) on fear appeal studies concluded that fearful messages produce a peak of perceived severity and vulnerability, and result as being greatly persuasive in encouraging people to adopt desired behaviors.”
Defensive reactions to health-promoting information: an overview and implications for future research (2013, methodology): “…& Allen, 2000), meta-analytic evidence for models of health motivation (e.g., Floyd, Prentice Dunn, & Rogers, 2000; Milne, Sheeran, & Orbell, 2000; Witte & Allen, 2000), the relationship between risk perceptions and health behaviours (e.g., Brewer et al., 2007; Gerrard, Gibbons, & Bushman, 1996),…”
Fear appeals and persuasion: A review and update of the Extended Parallel Process Model. (2011, methodology): “Witte and Allen (2000) coded studies in their meta-analysis to assess the fit of three different fear appeal models.”
The role of fear appeals in improving driver safety: A review of the effectiveness of fear-arousing (threat) appeals in road safety advertising. (2007, methodology): “The earliest conceptualisations of the fear-persuasion relationship was based on drive theories which posited that fear appeals would evoke fear arousal and that fear, in turn, would act as a drive to motivate action (Witte & Allen, 2000).”
Threatening communication: a critical re-analysis and a revised meta-analytic test of fear appeal theory (2013, background): “Despite the past six decades of research into threat communication effectiveness (see Witte & Allen, 2000, for an excellent overview), consensus remains elusive.”
Determining Where the Wild Things will be: Using Psychological Theory to Find Tolerance for Large Carnivores (2014, background): “…consequences are likely and outweigh the benefits of not taking action), followed by (2) a high coping appraisal (i.e., high perceived control, or a belief that one is both able to take action to protect themselves and that taking such action will successfully lower the risk) (Witte & Allen 2000).”
Reexamining Fear Appeal Models from Cognitive Appraisal Theory and Functional Emotion Theory Perspectives (2016, result): “This study found support for the former, which helps us explain a consistent finding—a positive relationship between fear and persuasive outcomes—in several meta-analyses of fear appeal research (e.g., Boster & Mongeau, 1984; de Hoog, Stroebe, & de Wit, 2007; Witte & Allen, 2000).”
Effects of Goal Framing and Emotions on Perceived Threat and Willingness to Sacrifice for Climate Change (2017, background): “And, as a meta-analysis of fear appeals by Witte and Allen (2000) shows, perceived severity and susceptibility increase as fear appeals get stronger.”
Investigating the Long-Term Impacts of Climate Change Communications on Individuals’ Attitudes and Behavior (2014, background): “Fear appeals need to be combined with high-efficacy messages (useful information about how to avoid the threat) in order not to trigger maladaptive defensive responses (Lewis, Watson, & White, 2010; Moser, 2007; Witte & Allen, 2000).”