source expertise
Definition
Source expertise refers to individuals' perceptions of a source's knowledge, competence, and epistemic authority, comprising source characteristics such as seniority, professional activities, or education that predict reliance on and acceptance of information from that source. As a key dimension of source credibility alongside trustworthiness and bias, source expertise can function as either a peripheral cue influencing persuasion when cognitive elaboration is low, or as an issue-relevant argument or processor bias under conditions of moderate to high elaboration. In misinformation contexts, the effects of source expertise on belief change and information acceptance remain inconsistent compared to the robust findings in persuasion research, partly because studies often conflate different credibility dimensions or fail to investigate them as separate constructs.
Sources: Mang et al. (2024)
Related Terms
Applications
Source Expertise and Cognitive Elaboration
Source expertise operates differently depending on the extent of individuals' motivation and ability to elaborate on misinformation or persuasive messages. Under low elaboration, expertise functions as a peripheral cue; under moderate elaboration, it can alter the extent of processing; and under high elaboration, it can act as an issue-relevant argument or bias message processing.
Sources: Mang et al. (2024)
Source Expertise and Perceived Accuracy
Source credibility dimensions, including expertise, are linked to cognitive outcomes such as perceived accuracy in misinformation research.
Sources: Mang et al. (2024)
