ABSTRACT
The most basic element of the third-person effect is the self. As the source of all third-person data, the individual comprising self is vital to research and our understanding of the processes driving these perceptions, but the self is also perhaps the most elusive component in the model. For instance, although the mechanism driving third-person perceptions lies within the individual, he or she cannot (or will not) accurately tell us why messages may affect others more than himself or herself. The self is the one variable that researchers cannot manipulate, and as such, it has tended to receive less attention than the message or the definition of “others” that make for intriguing experiments.
