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Randomized trial examines how recommendation sources affect freedom threat perceptions in diverse populations, suggesting strategies for better acceptance.
We answered scholars’ call to extend psychological reactance theory (PRT) by examining how recommendation sources – interpersonal or organizational with varying levels of expertise – impact freedom threat perceptions among a diverse sample of Black/African American, Hispanic/Latino/a, and White participants. Participants (N = 1,229) were randomly assigned to one message in a 4 source (friend, doctor, trusted health organization, and non-health organization) by 2 freedom-threatening language (aggravated and mitigated) web-based experiment across two topics (fruit/vegetables and exercise). PRT's theoretical propositions were supported and directly comparable across participants and sources. Freedom threat perceptions differed across sources and participants. Our findings underscore the importance of considering both source type and audience diversity and highlight a novel source-based strategy to reduce freedom threat and improve recommendation acceptance.
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Yan et al. (2026) studied this question.
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