Indirect searches

Credibility of the motor vehicle message. All participants stated that the motor vehicle message was believable. As the following comment from one of the participants suggests, which reflected the sentiment of most others, making changes to the message may decrease message persuasiveness.

“As a younger driver, if you did change it [the motor vehicle message] I’d probably lose interest” (20M)

While all participants perceived the motor vehicle message to be believable, suggestions on how to enhance the persuasiveness of this message differed according to gender. Specifically, female participants provided suggestions on how to make the motor vehicle message safer, while some of the male drivers stated that an increase in engine size and power of the vehicle would increase the persuasiveness of the message.

“Like V10, V12, the higher you go the more impressive it becomes” (20M)

“... if it [the motor vehicle message] said twin turbo V4, I’d probably be more interested” (20M)

In Australia, smaller powered engines are more common than higher power engines, such as V10, V12, or twin turbo V4 engines (Australian Government, 2011). In an attempt to make the vehicle message more relevant to the majority of young drivers, it was decided that no changes would be made to increase the vehicle’s engine size in this message. Further, as the vehicle stimulus was included in Study 2 to activate the BIS (i.e., examine participant reactions to competing reward and punishment goals between the motor vehicle message

110 (BAS) and social loss-framed message (FFFS)), no changes were made to improve the safety

of the vehicle presented in the vehicle message.

Motor vehicle message and gender differences. As found in relation to the road safety messages, participants’ reactions towards the motor vehicle message appeared to differ according to gender. Specifically, while male participants found the motor vehicle message to be persuasive, female participants were not persuaded and instead perceived the vehicle message to be irresponsible. For instance, male participants responded favourably towards the motor vehicle message and all but one male stated that they wanted to test drive the vehicle presented in this message.

“It’s awesome, I want this car” (19M)

“Driving cars like that is fun...” (21M)

“It’s not really about the ‘envy of all your mates’, screw my mates, I just want to drive that car” (19M)

“If I had the opportunity I would test drive it [the car]. I would be like, yes please”

(20M)

“I would test drive it [the car]... it would be pretty fun I think” (21M)

Such comments suggest that the male participants liked and were potentially persuaded by this vehicle message. In contrast to the male participants, female participants appeared not to be persuaded by the motor vehicle message and instead identified that it promoted dangerous behaviour.

“That’s a dangerous car. I guess that guys would like it. It doesn’t really appeal to me cause I don’t want a dangerous car” (18F)

“It doesn’t say that speeding is good but, it kind of says like, look, this is what you can do” (19F) “Totally irresponsible” (21F) “Like come buy our car and jump on the

111 highway and go insane” (19F) “It’s like challenging people almost. See how fast you

can go without getting caught” (21F) “That’s exactly what it’s like” (19F)

“It just doesn’t appeal to me because just driving at 110 is a bit scary for me” (17F) Such findings suggest that the promotion of high performance vehicles in

advertisements may not appeal to young female drivers. Unlike male participants, female participants perceived the vehicle in the message to be dangerous and unsafe. As discussed in chapter 4, one explanation for this finding may be that male drivers consider risky driving behaviours to be more acceptable compared to female drivers (Redshaw, 2006). Further, previous research has reported that male drivers invest more of their identity into the performance of a motor vehicle than female drivers (Steg, 2005). Thus, since male drivers may place stronger importance on the performance of their vehicles, exposure to high performance advertisements may be more appealing to this cohort of drivers compared to female drivers. However, it should also be noted and acknowledged that viewing the road safety messages first may have primed female participants to have heightened negative reactions towards the vehicle message.

Motor vehicle message and the BAS. For the motor vehicle message, only the male participants perceived this message to include reward cues.

“With younger people they can’t drive it but, it sounds like a fantasy... it’s something to look forward to” (19M)

“I’m going to see how fast she can go, you know, like you just get excited... it’s very exciting” (19M)

“To experience 0-100 in 6 seconds, that sort of acceleration would be exciting” (20M) These responses highlight that the description of the vehicle presented in the message elicited positive emotions for the majority of male participants. As discussed in chapter 2, section 2.2.3 the BAS is activated on the anticipation of receiving a reward, not actually

112 obtaining the reward per se (Smillie et al., 2011). While the majority of male participants

acknowledged that they are unable to drive this high performance vehicle due to licence restrictions,²⁸ their comments indicated that the thought of driving this vehicle would be exciting and in the words of one participant ‘...something to look forward to”. Thus, the motor vehicle message was considered an appropriate stimulus to activate the BAS and, as such, no changes were made to this message for Study 2.