Extended parallel process model: Difference between revisions

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The '''extended parallel process model''' ('''EPPM''') is a fear appeal theory developed by communications scholar [[Kim Witte]] that evaluates how individuals react to fear-inducing messages. It was first published in [[Communication Monographs|''Communication Monographs'']], Volume 59, December 1992; Witte subsequently published an initial test of the model in a later article in [[Communication Monographs|''Communication Monographs'']], Volume 61, June 1994.

The EPPM was developed by Witte as a response to the significant inconsistencies in fear appeal literature, serving as an extension of previous fear appeal models, hence the 'extended' in EPPM. The model is basedoriginally initiallybased on Leventhal's Parallel Process Model - a danger and fear control framework that studied how adaptive protective behaviour stemmed from attempts of danger control.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Leventhal|first=H|date=June 1971-06|title=Fear appeals and persuasion: the differentiation of a motivational construct.|url=http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/10.2105/AJPH.61.6.1208|journal=American Journal of Public Health|language=en|volume=61|issue=6|pages=1208–1224|doi=10.2105/AJPH.61.6.1208|issn=0090-0036|pmc=1529874PMC1529874|pmid=4110702}}</ref> It also significantly draws from Roger's [[Protection motivation theory]], which proposes two responses to fear-inducing stimuli: threat appraisal and coping appraisal.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Rogers|first=Ronald W.|date=September 1975-09|title=A Protection Motivation Theory of Fear Appeals and Attitude Change1|url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00223980.1975.9915803|journal=The Journal of Psychology|language=en|volume=91|issue=1|pages=93–114|doi=10.1080/00223980.1975.9915803|issn=0022-3980}}</ref>

The model's main theory is that when confronted with a fear-inducing stimulus, humans tend to engage in two simultaneous ways of message processing: a perceived efficacy appraisal (cognitive processing) and a perceived threat appraisal (emotional processing). Differences in message appraisal then lead to two behavioural outcomes, with individuals engaging in either a danger control process or a fear control process. In the case of the message being perceived as having no element of threat, individuals do not exhibit a response, and the message is ignored. The EPPM recommends that the danger control process leads to behavioural change, while the fear control process does not.

Witte's EPPM expands on previous fear appeal studies by explaining the reasons for failure in fear appeals and reincorporating fear as a central variable in the model. The first fear appeal model also outlines the relationship between threat and efficacy in propositional forms.