The present study introduced the “Inoculated Spiral of Silence (ISoS)” effect in the context of Hong Kong, by exploring the effect of individual characteristics on the weaving relationship of inoculation and the spiral of silence associated with people’s attitude change and behaviour intention. An experiment was conducted with a two-wave survey to test the effect on the controversial issue of Article 23 of the Hong Kong Basic Law. The core findings from data analysis indicated that inoculation would generate more resistance to attitude change and promote more willingness to speak out in public. Moreover, inoculation would grow more resistance to attitude change for people highly involved in the issues, but would produce lower resistance to attitude change for the hardcore resistors. As an innovation of the study, testing “hardcore characteristics” in effect was the first time crossed past literature on the spiral of silence and inoculation to consider such a concept. The present study could further provide a better understanding of both the ISoS effect and public opinion in Hong Kong, introducing a novel perspective for academics and professionals to address issues of controversy with effective communication strategies of persuasion in various fields, such as political campaigning and public policymaking.
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