Answer to Question #200920 in Psychology for Emmanuel Egbuagha

Question

Discuss the application of central and peripheral routes to a Covid-19 campaign

Answer 1

The central route of persuasion is the high degree of the thoughtfulness of an individual concerning an argument, an idea, an issue, or a statement. It has two prerequisites, which are, motivation and ability. When an individual is motivated by a problem, the person will tend to apply a high degree of thinking to the problem as compared to a situation where the same individual is not motivated. On the other hand, when an individual can understand an issue, the individual can apply a high level of thoughtfulness to it. Therefore, when the central route is applied in the covid-19 campaign, we can agree that people only gave a high degree of thinking about the infection when the effects of the disease were evident to them and when they could clearly understand every information about the infection. Therefore, the effects of the infection motivated people towards the campaign trail of the Covid-19.

However, the peripheral route of persuasion occurs when an individual decides to apply a high or low degree of thinking about an issue. For example, an individual may decide to apply a high degree of thinking about an issue only when the issue appears attractive or when the issue is presented by an expert. In terms of the Covid-19 campaign, most people never gave a high degree of thinking about covid-19, because, many thought it was a flu that was passing without having an adverse effect on people. People never minded about the information given by experts from other countries until the time when the infection hit their countries. Individuals were then motivated to give a high degree of thoughtfulness about the pandemic only when there was a global concern about infection.