Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Cigarette Smoking And Its Effect Upon Perceptions Of Source Credibility, Cari L. Tokheim

Student Work

This thesis examined the effect of cigarette smoking on perceptions of source credibility. Twenty-five bi-polar adjectives were used to measure five dimensions of credibility (competency, character, sociability, composure, and extroversion) developed by McCroskey and Jenson. Subjects recruited from students enrolled at the University of Nebraska at Omaha (n = 272) were assigned one of four versions of a photograph depicting either a male or female model holding a cigarette, or those same models in identical photographs with the cigarette removed. Subjects were then asked to complete the credibility scales, based upon the person depicted in the photograph.

Results from the …