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BACKGROUND. Message avoidance (e.g., trying not to look at the message) may be motivated by reactance, a maladaptive rejection of the message. An alternative view is that avoidance indicates that a message is eliciting fear and other negative affect, thereby increasing the likelihood of behavioral change. We sought to identify which psychological mechanism (reactance or fear and other negative affect) explains message avoidance. We also examined whether avoidance was associated with more forgoing or butting out of cigarettes. METHODS. Trial 1 randomly assigned 2,149 adult U.S. smokers to receive either pictorial warnings (intervention) or text-only warnings (control) on their cigarette packs for four weeks in 2014 and 2015. Trial 2 randomly assigned 719 adult U.S. smokers to receive either messages about toxic chemicals in cigarette smoke (intervention) or messages about not littering cigarette butts (control) for three weeks in 2016 and 2017. Negative affect included fear, anxiety, disgust, sadness, and guilt. Reactance included perceived threat to freedom, anger, and counterarguing. RESULTS. Intervention messages led to greater message avoidance in both trials (both p |
