It was postulated that cultural truisms (beliefs accepted without question by the members of a given society) appear very strong but actually prove highly vulnerable to persuasive attacks, because the believer is unpracticed in defending them. To stimulate the person to develop his defenses and acquire resistance to persuasion, it is necessary to threaten him, rather than further reassure him, about the validity of his belief. It was found, as predicted, that intrinsically threatening defenses (which, analogous to biological innoculation, pre-expose the believer to the attacking arguments in weakened form) confer more resistance to later persuasive attacks than do completely reassuring defenses. Moreover, giving the believer prior reassurance that his belief is true (by giving him feedback that his peers are in complete agreement with him about the truism's validity) weakens the immunizing efficacy of the defenses.
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Anderson et al. (1965) studied this question.