Psychological ownership: a social marketing advertising message appeal?

The authors assessed psychological ownership as a potential persuasive advertising message appeal in social marketing efforts. Psychological ownership is a feeling of possession; it occurs when individuals feel that something is theirs even though they cannot hold legal title to it. Interestingly, the first study indicated advertising messages that generate psychological ownership yielded less favourable attitudes, word of mouth and willingness to pay price premiums among women. Women responded more negatively to messages that attempted to induce psychological ownership than to neutral messages. The adverse responses of women prompted the second study, in which both the psychological ownership message and cognitive capacity were manipulated. Results indicate that, in a limited cognitive capacity condition, women responded similarly towards higher psychological ownership and neutral advertising messages. Further, these effects were mediated by inferences of manipulative intent and not feelings of guilt. Theoretical and managerial implications are offered for marketers attempting to use psychological ownership as an advertising message strategy and gender as a segmentation strategy.     

内疚广告诉求对消费者道德消费意愿的影响机制研究

基于认知失调理论和心理抗拒理论,通过两个实验探究了企业道德营销中内疚与非内疚诉求影响消费者道德消费意愿的心理作用机制。结果表明,内疚诉求比非内疚诉求更能促进消费者的道德消费意愿,强迫性感受和操纵意图推断发挥了中介作用,且该中介作用受到消费者涉入度的调节。具体而言,低消费者涉入度情境中,相比于非内疚诉求,内疚诉求能够降低消费者的强迫性感受和操纵意图推断,进而增强其道德消费意愿;高消费者涉入度情境中,相比于内疚诉求,非内疚诉求能够降低消费者的强迫性感受和操纵意图推断,进而增强其道德消费意愿。研究结论有助于企业设计道德属性产品的广告策略,有效降低受众心理抗拒反应,提升受众广告体验,进而推动道德消费。     

How organizational identification among retail employees is affected by advertising

This paper investigates whether the organizational identification among retailer employees can be influenced by advertising aimed at consumers. The results of an experimental study of employees at a large grocery retailer show a positive impact of advertising exposure on organizational identification. Employee perceptions of advertising effectiveness (and not their feelings of pride with regards to the advertising) are found to explain this effect. The results suggest that advertising can serve an important human resource role tool by helping retailers build organizational identification amongst its employees. Further managerial implications are discussed in the paper.     

Positive Mood and Susceptibility to False Advertising

This paper examines the impact of mood on consumers' implicit and explicit responses to false advertising. In our first experiment, we find that those consumers in a positive (versus a negative or neutral) mood state are more likely to notice the false information in the advertising, but paradoxically, are also likely to develop positive feelings toward the brand. In that experiment, we used both a hedonic brand (Disney) and a hedonic/emotional ad (autobiographical). In our second experiment, we extend the ad stimulus context beyond Disney to Wendy's to more readily facilitate autobiographical versus informational manipulations. We find that, indeed, the hedonic advertising execution (autobiographical vis-à-vis informational) is associated with more elaborate processing (but only for those in a positive mood). The observed positive affect transfer continued, however, despite the greater detection of the false information in the positive mood condition. We propose that the negative feelings toward the ad associated with detecting the false information are momentary and are replaced by positive feelings toward the brand that are engendered by positive mood and the advertising, as suggested by the synapse model of memory. Our third experiment varies the timing of our measures to investigate this proposition and finds that timing does matter. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of the findings for research on mood, deceptive advertising, and implicit versus explicit effects of advertising response.     

Consumer Attitudes toward and use of Advertising Content in a Small Daily Newspaper

Results of the study indicate that the advertising content of the newspaper in the present study is viewed as local news by its subscribers and consequently has the highest readership of any type of content in this paper. While it was assumed that the advertising content of this newspaper would be well-read, the magnitude of readership and reader-interest in advertising was surprising.

In regard to questions concerning the reader's attitude toward the amount of advertising carried by the newspaper under study, it was found that rather than feeling there was too much advertising in the paper, the majority felt that it was either “just right” or that they wanted more advertising in the future.

This article is based in part on a paper presented for the Advertising Division at the Association for Education in Journalism convention in Ottawa, Canada, August 16–20, 1975.     

Chinese children’s attitudes towards television advertising: truthfulness and liking

This benchmarking study examines Chinese children.s perceived truthfulness of and liking for television advertising in three Chinese cities with different developmental levels of advertising. An in-person survey of 1758 children (ages 6 to 14) was conducted between December 2001 and March 2002 using a structured questionnaire. Results indicate that a majority of children perceive half of the television commercials to be true, although this varies by grade and geography. Children in Beijing perceived television commercials to be more trustworthy than did children in Nanjing and Chengdu. The percentage of children who perceive all commercials to be true declines consistently with grade in all three cities. There is a high proportion of first graders who perceive all commercials to be untrue. The basis for judgement varies predominantly by grade. Children in higher grades depend more on brand and user experience while children in lower grades rely mainly on authority (i.e. parents or teachers). A high proportion of first graders hold both a strong liking and disliking for commercials. These strong feelings towards advertising decreased with grade, being replaced by a marked increase in neutral or indifferent feelings. Gender and level of television viewing do not show a consistent impact on perceived truthfulness and liking for commercials. Perceived truthfulness of television advertising is related positively with liking for commercials.     

Asian food: the global and the local

Advertising practice makes use of emotional cues and addresses consumers' rising desire for social connection. Research has investigated emotions within advertising, but mainly focused on negative or positive emotions. Traditional academic approaches to the analysis of persuasion according to the elaboration likelihood model (ELM) tend to emphasize central processing and thus rational advertising cues. Moreover, the role of motivation within the ELM is underspecified. We introduce the Zurich Model of Social Motivation to the regulation of social distance and investigate the specific feeling of care and security. This feeling may serve as motivational component and emerge as persuasion instrument within advertising. We seek to find means to activate viewers, independent from involvement. As we initially apply the model, we match constructs from advertising research to the framework. The feeling of care and security is determined by the autobiographical fit, the amount of personal resemblance, and familiarity with the cue. Realism of the story describes the (psychological) distance, whereas emotionality of the story refers to relevancy of the objects shown. We apply a structural equation modelling approach to test our hypotheses with smart partial least squares. Autobiographical fit is the strongest driver, followed by the realism and emotionality of the story. The feeling of care and security significantly predicts attitude toward the advertisement Group comparison according to Chin by the level of involvement shows that all causal relations remain stable for both sub-groups. Our findings suggest that specific emotional cues may have a special role within information processing and that there is no need to always focus on the central route of processing.     

Attitudes Towards Advertising Among Executives in Saudi Arabia

The executives of 65 Saudi companies were surveyed to determine their attitudes toward five issues in advertising: need for advertising; economic concerns; social concerns; ethical concerns; and regulation of advertising. The findings of the study indicated that the executives generally held mixed feelings toward advertising. While concurring with the need for advertising, they showed concern for the high costs of advertising and supported the need for regulating advertising aimed at children and for harmful products.     

商品广告设计中的色彩视觉效果研究

在商品广告设计中,色彩起着十分重要的视感作用。通过对色彩视觉的特性、功能性、情感性三方面分析,了解色彩对人们视觉刺激的心理感应作用,及商品广告色彩运用的表现手法和视觉效果。加强商品广告色彩视觉上的认识,对促进广告色彩设计运用会有帮助作用。     

The influence of advertising on the demand for chocolate confectionery

This paper addresses the impact of advertising on the size of five European chocolate confectionery markets: Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK. It is prompted by suggestions that advertising may be responsible for excessive consumption of confectionery by children. The literature on whether advertising affects the total market size is not one-sided but the balance of previous research indicates market effects to be less likely. Chocolate confectionery in Western Europe is a mature market in slow decline. We found no significant association between the weight of advertising and market growth with either contemporaneous or lagged effects. There was, however, negative correlation between market size and price, as was to be expected. The results were consistent across the five countries.     

Attitudes of Indonesian Mothers Toward Food Advertising Directed to Children

Advertising directed toward children is a controversial issue with growing concerns from parents around the world, including emerging markets such as Indonesia. The reasons for its negative effects include that such advertising could lead to materialism, parent–child conflict, and feelings of unhappiness. In particular, advertising by food companies is a target for criticism due to concerns about unhealthy food and childhood obesity. This article reports on the findings of a number of focus groups of Indonesian mothers to obtain an indication of the mothers’ ethical judgment toward such advertising. The results identify reasons why the mothers found particular advertisements to be unethical and ways advertisements can improve their message. From the responses, some important issues are raised that would be of interest to international advertisers.     

The Influence of Repetitive Health Messages and Sensitivity to Fluency on the Truth Effect in Advertising

Although merely repeating a product claim does not influence the objective validity of the claim, it often increases the subjective validity of the claim (the truth effect). Research notes that the truth effect plays an important role in health advertising. The present research investigates the moderating role of sensitivity to feelings of fluency (or processing ease) on the truth effect. The truth effect was more pronounced when the need for affect was high rather than low (Study 1) and when consumers were primed to trust their feelings (Study 2). Finally, Study 3 and Study 4 replicate these findings using advertising appeals. Advertisements that encourage consumers to focus on their feelings increase susceptibility to the truth effect.     

Reaching Goals and Doing Good: Exploring Consumer Responses to Meaningful Advertisements

The purpose of this study is to investigate how consumers respond to meaningful advertisements, which promote products or brands by portraying moral virtues and life meaning. The authors present findings of an online survey in which participants reported their responses to two meaningful advertisements. A conceptual model was proposed and tested based on the survey data. Results demonstrated that when viewing meaningful advertisements participants' perceptions of meaningfulness positively influenced their feelings of elevation, which leaded to favorable attitudes towards the advertisement and brand. Empathy served as a moderator in the conceptual model. Participants who felt low empathy actually experienced stronger feelings of elevation. This study presents how consumers respond to portrayals of moral virtues and life meaning in advertisements. It contributes to the literature of advertising by demonstrating that the emotion of elevation benefits advertising effectiveness. It has significant implications to advertising professionals as well.     

Does advertising grow markets?

Many observers believe advertising increases market size (with the implication that fewer people would smoke or drink alcohol or buy cars if there were no advertising for those products), and that it works by creating desires. This paper examines the historical evidence and recent case histories of successful marketing campaigns from the UK’s IPA Effectiveness Awards. It turns out that very few advertisers have tried to increase the size of their market or claim to have done so. In the few cases that describe an increase in market size, we see consumers switching from one type of product to another, without increasing their total category consumption. No case claims to have created a new desire. The inference is that banning or restricting advertising may be an ineffective instrument of social policy.     

Luxury brand advertising in Argentina: Changes following import restrictions

This study explores how the change of an economic policy affects advertising practices in Argentina. A content analysis of luxury brand ads placed in fashion magazines in Argentina was conducted to investigate changes in the ads in the wake of the import restrictions. The data supports the notion that some ads reflect societal changes. After the restrictions, ads were more likely to be factual, less likely to convey emotional messages, and ad appeals tended to be simple. Additionally, findings indicate that ads used different visual cues to evoke stronger exclusivity, luxuriousness, and global feelings. Ad components that are deeply rooted in local cultures, however, were not influenced by the restrictions.     

The Effects of Ad Irritation on Brand Attitudes

Abstract

Brand attitude has been proposed to be an antecedent to purchase intentions. However, very few studies have specifically focused on ad irritation as an antecedent to attitude towards the brand. This paper examines the effect of ad irritation on brand attitudes and if the effect of ad irritation is independent of ad credibility, attitude towards the advertiser, attitude towards advertising, and ad-induced feelings. The results indicated that ad irritation was not significant in predicting brand attitudes. Respondents' prior brand attitude, ad credibility, ad-induced feelings and attitude towards the advertiser were significant predictors of brand attitudes. Based on the results, several managerial implications were derived regarding the usefulness of ad irritation in changing brand attitudes.     

Continuous measurement of self-report of emotional response

There has been substantial recent interest in measurement of emotional responses to advertising. One of the promising methods recently introduced has been the continuous measurement of specific feelings through a “warmth monitor” introduced by Aaker, Stayman, and Hagerty (1986). This article reports research extending the work of Aaker, Stayman, and Hagerty (1986) in two ways. First, it tests whether the warmth monitor method distinguishes feelings from the global reactions that are more commonly measured with continuous self-report measures. Second, it tests the extension of the method to a general emotion monitor that measures feelings other than warmth. Support is found for discrimination between feelings and overall liking and for the validity of a humor, but possibly not irritation, monitor. © 1993 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

A Factor Analysis of College Student Attitudes toward Advertising

Eighty college students were administered 26 Likert-type statements designed to measure their attitudes toward advertising along four different dimensions: 1) economic effects of advertising, 2) social effects of advertising, 3) ethics of advertising and 4) regulation of advertising. Analysis of the responses revealed five clusters or “types” of individuals based on their attitudes. While all five types exhibited some negative feelings toward advertising the degree of, and basis for, their criticisms varied considerably. Findings such as these indicate the need for a better understanding of the reasons for student dissatisfaction with the activities of the advertising community and a more comprehensive program for the dissemination of information about advertising and its activities to a wider cross-section of the college student today.     

So happy for your loss: Consumer schadenfreude increases choice satisfaction

Consumers often feel schadenfreude, an emotion reflecting an experience of pleasure over misfortunes of another. Schadenfreude has found wide use in advertising, but its actual consequences for consumers have not been thoroughly documented. The present research investigates the effect of schadenfreude on consumers' satisfaction with choices they have made. Building on the feelings-as-information theory, the authors posit that consumers take their positive feelings of schadenfreude over another's unrelated bad purchase as positive information about their own choices, and through such misattribution become more satisfied with their own choices. Three experiments show that feeling schadenfreude over another consumer's bad purchase makes consumers more satisfied with their own choices (Study 1), regardless of whether the other's bad purchase is in the same or in a different product category as one's own choice (Study 2), but only so long as consumers are not aware that they are engaging in misattribution (Study 3). The present research contributes to the literature on schadenfreude and feelings-as-information theory. Its findings may be used by marketers aiming to exert an unconscious influence on consumer satisfaction.     

The effect of media,product and message factors on ad persuasiveness: the role of affect and cognition

The effects of media, product and advertising strategy variables on consumers' thoughts and feelings are investigated. Both direct and indirect paths from the advertising variables to ad persuasiveness measures are also analysed with the indirect paths leading through affective and cognitive responses. Two hundred and forty television and magazine ads are analysed with respect to advertising variables, affect, cognition and ad persuasiveness. Results indicate that advertising variables are indirectly linked to ad persuasiveness with the indirect path occurring through affective and cognitive responses.