Do warriors, villagers and scientists decide differently? The impact of role on message framing

Abstract

The role people play in real or virtual environments can have an influence on how we make decisions. Furthermore, it has been suggested that stimulating analytic or impulsive information processing can influence framing effects. In this study we combine these previous results and examine whether virtual role-playing influences the strength of the effect of message framing. Participants were subjected to an experiment in which they played different characters in a computer game. Within the game, the effects of different types of message framing where measured. The results suggest that susceptibility to attribute framing increases when role-playing an impulsive character. The current study contributes to the existing literature both by demonstrating a novel effect virtual role playing has on our information processing, as well as by introducing games as a novel medium for studying the effects of message framing.