Fantasy proneness
As early as 1953, Hovland, Janis, and Kelly suggested that
an important meditational process in persuasion may be the
receiver’s ability to imagine the possible consequences of a
communicator’s proposal. The receiver more predisposed to
imagine the behavior desired by the communicator should
be more likely to adopt the behavior, and vice versa. Janis
(1959) conceptualized this meditational process as “richness
of fantasy,” a construct dealing with the amount of detail and
vividness in an individual’s imagination with reference to a
wide range of stimuli (as cited by Infante, 1975).
The different imaginary dispositions of individuals can be
considered a personality trait. The concept of FP was introduced
to refer to a set of characteristics of a small group of
people labeled fantasizers, who often displayed an extensive
and deep involvement in fantasy, an accidental discovery
made during a study of hypnostic susceptibility (Wilson
and Barber, 1983). An array of features identified by Wilson
and Barber (1983) as typical for FP includes spending a large
part of time fantasizing, having fantasy with hallucinatory
intensities, vivid childhood memories, and experiencing
strong bodily concomitants of fantasies.