Influence of perceptions of organizations and perceptions of issues on communicative behaviors: Roles of conspiratorial thinking and responsibility attribution

A few research studies in public relations have identified significant associations between relational and situational variables in the context of a specific issue involving an organization. Despite this, no research to date has explained why and how these associations occur. Therefore, this study tests the roles of conspiratorial thinking and responsibility attribution in influencing the confluence of publics’ perceptions of an organization with their perceptions about an issue involving the organization. Situating the study in the context of the Australian Government and the issue of high-rise overdevelopment, an online survey was conducted with a nationally representative sample of 400 Australian citizens. The results showed that publics with high levels of distrust and political cynicism toward the government also reported high conspiratorial thinking about the government. Conspiratorial thinking was significantly associated with responsibility attribution to the government for causing the issue of high-rise overdevelopment. Subsequently, publics developed situational perceptions and motivations about the issue. The findings showed that even if individuals attribute responsibility to the government for causing an issue, as long as they have high situational activeness in the issue, they will engage in proactive communicative behaviors to seek, forefend and forward information from the government.