Notes on Skurnik et al. (2005) – How Warnings about False Claims Become Recommendations

Paper: “How Warnings about False Claims Become Recommendations,” Journal of Consumer Research, 31 (4), 713–24.

Main Topic or Phenomenon

This paper examines the paradoxical effect where repeated warnings about false consumer claims can lead people, particularly older adults, to misremember those claims as true over time. The study investigates how attempts to debunk misinformation can backfire and actually increase belief in false information.

Theoretical Construct

The paper builds on the illusion of truth effect - the phenomenon where people tend to believe information is true simply because it feels familiar from prior exposure. The core theoretical framework involves:

Constructive Memory Theory: People make truth judgments based on two types of information:

• Context memory: Recollection of truth-specifying details (e.g., whether something was labeled “true” or “false”)
• Familiarity: A general sense of having encountered the information before

Key principle: When context memory fades but familiarity remains, people rely on familiarity as a cue for truth, leading to the erroneous acceptance of false information as true.

Key Findings

Experiment 1 (Age × Repetition × Delay):

• After 30 minutes: Repetition helped both age groups remember false claims as false
• After 3 days: Repetition backfired for older adults - they were more likely to remember repeatedly warned false claims as true (28% for once-presented vs. 40% for thrice-presented false claims)
• Younger adults maintained better accuracy even after delay

Experiment 2 (Timing of Truth Disclosure):

• When truth was disclosed every time: Repetition helped memory accuracy
• When truth was disclosed only at the end: Repetition harmed memory, especially for older adults (35% of repeated false claims remembered as true)

Boundary Conditions and Moderators

Age: The primary moderator - older adults show greater susceptibility to the illusion of truth effect

• Older adults have intact familiarity processing but declining context memory
• Age differences emerge primarily after delays when context memory fades

Delay: Short delays (20-30 minutes) vs. long delays (3 days)

• Short delays: Repetition helps accuracy for both age groups
• Long delays: Repetition backfires for older adults but continues to help younger adults

Timing of context presentation:

• Immediate context (truth disclosed with each presentation) vs. delayed context (truth disclosed only at final presentation)
• Delayed context leads to backfire effects even with short delays

Building on Previous Work

Extends prior research on the illusion of truth effect by:

• Identifying age-related vulnerabilities not previously documented
• Demonstrating that the effect occurs even when people are explicitly warned information is false
• Showing temporal dynamics - how the effect changes over time

Challenges the Spinozan processor model: This model suggests people automatically encode information as true and must effortfully tag it as false. The paper’s findings (repetition helping short-term but hurting long-term memory) cannot be explained by this encoding-focused theory.

Supports constructive memory theory: The dissociation between familiarity and context memory, especially the differential time courses of these processes, supports retrieval-based rather than encoding-based explanations.

Major Theoretical Contribution

The paper advances understanding of memory-based consumer judgment by:

1. Identifying a new consumer vulnerability: Showing how consumer protection efforts can backfire
2. Demonstrating the temporal dynamics of truth judgments - how the same manipulation (repetition) can have opposite effects over time
3. Providing evidence for constructive memory processes in consumer contexts, showing that truth judgments are made at retrieval rather than encoding
4. Revealing age-related differences in susceptibility to marketing and misinformation

Major Managerial Implications

For regulators and consumer protection:

• Simply repeating that claims are false can be counterproductive, especially for older consumers
• Information campaigns should focus on what IS true rather than repeatedly stating what is false
• Warning strategies need to account for delayed effects and age-related vulnerabilities

For marketers:

• Repetition increases perceived truthfulness over time, even for information initially labeled as false
• Older consumers are particularly susceptible to familiarity-based truth judgments
• Timing of corrective information matters - immediate correction is more effective than delayed correction

Unexplored Theoretical Factors

Several potential moderators were not examined that could influence the illusion of truth effect:

Individual difference factors:

• Cognitive resources/working memory capacity
• Need for cognition
• Health consciousness or involvement with the topic
• Prior knowledge or expertise in the domain

Message characteristics:

• Source credibility of the warning
• Emotional valence of the claims
• Concreteness vs. abstractness of claims
• Strength of the warning language

Environmental factors:

• Processing motivation at encoding vs. retrieval
• Social context (presence of others)
• Stress or time pressure during judgment
• Multiple source exposures

Metacognitive factors:

• Confidence in memory judgments
• Awareness of the illusion of truth effect
• Strategic memory processes or source monitoring training

Reference

Skurnik, Ian, Carolyn Yoon, Denise C. Park, and Norbert Schwarz (2005), “How Warnings about False Claims Become Recommendations,” Journal of Consumer Research, 31 (4), 713–24.