Departmental Papers (ASC)
Document Type
Technical Report
Date of this Version
4-2018
Publication Source
Health Psychology
Volume
37
Issue
4
Start Page
375
Last Page
384
DOI
10.1037/hea0000574
Abstract
Objective: Worldwide, tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable death and illness. One common strategy for reducing the prevalence of cigarette smoking and other health risk behaviors is the use of graphic warning labels (GWLs). This has led to widespread interest from the perspective of health psychology in understanding the mechanisms of GWL effectiveness. Here we investigated differences in how the brain responds to negative, graphic warning label-inspired antismoking ads and neutral control ads, and we probed how this response related to future behavior.
Method: A group of smokers (N = 45) viewed GWL-inspired and control antismoking ads while undergoing fMRI, and their smoking behavior was assessed before and one month after the scan. We examined neural coherence between two regions in the brain’s valuation network, the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) and ventralstriatum (VS).
Results: We found that greater neural coherence in the brain’s valuation network during GWL ads (relative to control ads) preceded later smoking reduction.
Conclusions: Our results suggest that the integration of information about message value may be key for message influence. Understanding how the brain responds to health messaging and relates to future behavior could ultimately contribute to the design of effective messaging campaigns, as well as more broadly to theories of message effects and persuasion across domains.
Copyright/Permission Statement
© American Psychological Association, 2018. This paper is not the copy of record and may not exactly replicate the authoritative document published in the APA journal. Please do not copy or cite without author's permission. The final article is available, upon publication, at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/hea0000574
Keywords
behavior change, functional MRI (fMRI), neuroimaging, smoking, valuation
Recommended Citation
Cooper, N., Tompson, S., O'Donnell, M. B., Vettel, J. M., Bassett, D. S., & Falk, E. B. (2018). Associations between Coherent Neural Activity. Health Psychology, 37 (4), 375-384. https://doi.org/10.1037/hea0000574
Embargo Date
11-1-2018
Included in
Analytical, Diagnostic and Therapeutic Techniques and Equipment Commons, Biological Psychology Commons, Cognition and Perception Commons, Cognitive Psychology Commons, Graphic Communications Commons, Health Communication Commons, Neurology Commons, Neuroscience and Neurobiology Commons, Neurosciences Commons, Substance Abuse and Addiction Commons
Date Posted: 19 June 2018
This document has been peer reviewed.