Featuring an exemplar character similar to the target audience is one of the most widely used tactics of tailored and targeted communication. Having a similar character may increase the perceived relevance of the message and facilitate persuasion. However, the way the similar character is depicted may threaten the audience's social identity and cause a boomerang effect. In an experiment where daily smokers saw and evaluated anti-smoking messages, a significant interaction between character-audience similarity and message theme emerged, mediated by message engagement and character identification. Seeing a similar (vs. dissimilar) smoker character whose health was at risk increased the audience's identification with the character, which in turn was associated with greater perceived effectiveness. However, seeing a similar smoker character endangering innocent others via secondhand smoke undermined perceived effectiveness. The simple main effects of character-audience similarity on message engagement were not significant, although the overall pattern was consistent.

中文翻译：

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当相似性反击时：反吸烟运动中角色-观众相似性的有条件说服作用。

以与目标受众相似的典型角色为特色是最广泛使用的定制和有针对性的沟通策略之一。具有相似的特征可以增加信息的感知相关性并有助于说服。然而，相似角色的描绘方式可能会威胁观众的社会认同，并产生回旋镖效应。在一项实验中，每天吸烟的人看到并评估反吸烟信息，在信息参与和角色识别的调节下，角色-受众相似性和信息主题之间出现了显着的相互作用。看到一个相似（与不相似）且健康受到威胁的吸烟者角色会增加观众对该角色的认同感，这​​反过来又与更高的感知效果相关。然而，看到类似的吸烟者角色通过二手烟危及无辜他人，就削弱了感知效果。尽管总体模式是一致的，但角色-受众相似性对信息参与度的简单主效应并不显着。