AIDS public service announcements: effects of fear and repetition on predictors of condom use.

An experiment examined the effects of varying levels of fear and message repetition in a radio public service announcement (PSA) on attitudes toward and intentions to use condoms. Predictions were derived from the Theory of Reasoned Action and Fazio's accessibility model. Results suggest that repetition and fear have important effects on intentions to use condoms and attitudes toward using condoms, even after accounting for inputs specified by the Theory of Reasoned Action In addition, frequency affected the relative weights of attitudinal versus normative effects on intentions, suggesting that PSAs may be able to affect attitudes and intentions through spontaneous attitude activation as described by Fazio (1990).