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Social media have become an increasingly important venue for prosocial campaigns. Competing for the public’s attention in the digital space is an ongoing challenge. This study aims to test the influence of ad-context congruence, ad position and ad type (i.e. public service advertising [PSA] vs cause-related brand [CRB] advertising) on the effectiveness of prosocial native advertising on social media.

Two experiments were conducted on different social media platforms (i.e. Twitter and Instagram) with varied prosocial issues (i.e. healthy eating and environmental sustainability).

Experiment 1 indicated that the congruence between prosocial native ads and social media feeds elicited greater ad involvement and a more favorable ad attitude, regardless of ad position. Experiment 2 revealed that such an impact was contingent on whether the prosocial native ad was a public service ad or a CRB ad. The positive influence of ad-context congruence was pronounced among public service ads but was not observed among CRB ads. Perceived ad involvement mediated the interaction effects between ad-context congruence and ad type on ad attitude and behavioral intention.

The study extends ad-context congruence research to the context of prosocial native advertising on social media. Moreover, it identifies ad type as a boundary condition for the congruence effects and reveals that increased ad involvement is the mechanism underlying the positive effect of congruent PSA.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of interactivity and game-product congruence on the players’ feelings of presence and their brand attitude in the context of in-game advertising. Specifically, this research illustrates the conditions under which the brand placements in digital games create attention, engagement, subsequent feelings of presence and brand attitude by drawing the insights from the “limited capacity model of attention,” the “vividness effects theory” and the “transportation theory.”

A 2 (interactivity: high or low)×2 (game-product congruence: high or low) between-subject measures design is used. In total, 152 students participated in the study. A 2×2 between-subjects multivariate analysis of variance is used to test the hypotheses.

The results reveal that for a high game-product congruent game, high interactivity results in greater levels of feelings of presence than a low-interactivity condition. However, for a low game-product congruent game, both high- and low-interactivity conditions result in the same level of presence. Furthermore, the findings also show that for a high game-product congruent game, high interactivity results in more favorable brand attitude than a low-interactivity condition. On the other hand, for a low game-product congruent game, both high- and low-interactivity conditions result in the same level of brand attitude.

This paper provides implications for theory as well as practice by providing the empirical evidence of the combined effect of game-product congruence and interactivity on feelings of presence and brand attitude from the perspectives of attention, engagement and transportation of experiences in an emerging marketing context like India. The findings are useful for marketing practitioners in terms of effective in-game advertising, designing and execution. Future research can be conducted by exploring the in-game advertising effects of various other variables, such as product-involvement, game-involvement or game-repetition.

This investigation contributes to the literature of non-traditional advertising media, specifically to the area of branded entertainment, like brand placements in digital games by examining and exploring the influence of game-specific factors on the players’ feelings of presence and brand attitudes. Moreover, this paper is one of the first to reveal the real-time roles of game-specific factors in creating gamers’ feelings of presence and brand attitude from the perspectives of attention, engagement and transportation of experience in an emerging market context like India.

The primary purpose of the current study was to examine how the presence of two digital ad features – an ad skip option and an ad time display, representing behavioral and cognitive control, respectively – might influence viewer response to in-stream video ads in terms of perceived control, reactance and advertising outcomes.

A 2 (Ad skip option: presence vs. absence) × 2 (Ad time display: presence vs absence) between-subjects experiment was conducted online with 217 participants recruited via Qualtrics.

The results of the online experiment show that the presence of the ad skip option and ad time display related to a higher level of perceived control, predicting lower ad intrusiveness and ad irritation and more favorable attitude toward the ad.

The findings confirm that an ad skip option and an ad time display could minimize negative responses to in-stream video ads by increasing perceived control and reducing viewer reactance.

The findings provide empirical evidence that multiple dimensions of control features (i.e. behavioral and cognitive) can increase perceived control and strengthen its impact on advertising outcomes.

Brief loving-kindness meditation (LKM) is introduced here as a valid social marketing intervention. LKM positively influences prosocial cognitions and affects. However, it remains unclear whether brief meditation interventions can influence prosocial behavior. This study aims to provide evidence of the effects of short LKM on prosocial behavior.

This study reports the results of three experiments examining the effects of brief LKM on donations to unknown others. The results are then integrated with the results of seven other studies testing the effects of brief LKM on prosocial behavior using a meta-analysis (n = 683).

LKM increased love more than the control group (focused breathing) in the three experiments; however, its effects on donations were mixed. The meta-analysis shows that LKM has a small-to-medium significant effect compared to active control groups (d = 0.303); moreover, age and type of prosocial measure used moderate the effects.

Results suggest that LKM can nurture prosocial emotions such as love and lead young individuals to donate. However, these emotions may not be sufficient to lead adult meditators to share their resources with unknown others. This study presents the first meta-analysis of brief LKM and provides insights into the use of meditation in social marketing programs.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of congruity and endorsement on consumer attitudes toward sports website advertisements (Aad), the advertising brand (Abr), and consumers’ future intentions (FI).

The current study followed a 2×3 between-subjects experimental design. Sports celebrity (or the presence or absence of a sports celebrity in a banner ad) and the level of congruity between the website and banner ad (high congruity – soccer, medium congruity – snowboard, and low congruity – computer) were the primary independent variables. Data were collected in two stages. An initial pilot study (n=40) established the reliability and validity of the scaled measures guiding this test. The second phase of data collection, the main study, was conducted over a five-day period. A random assignment of treatment conditions (i.e. exposure to one of six banner ad manipulations) was followed by a series of short surveys designed to measure the dependent variables of subjects’ cognitive ad responses (i.e. Aad, Abr, and FI).

The results indicated that participants who viewed the ad with the endorsement showed a more positive Aad than those who viewed the ad without it. The participants with a high congruity condition reported a more positive Abr and higher FI than those with low or medium congruity.

This study extends the application of congruity theory to banner advertisements, thereby aiding our understanding of consumers’ perceptions of advertising.

Drawing on embodied cognition and construal level theory perspectives in marketing literature, the purpose of this study is to propose that closed eyes make events appear distant and increase high-level construal and abstract processing, whereas opened eyes make events appear near and increase low-level construal and concrete processing. The authors further argue that high (low) construal level induced by closed (open) eyes increases favoritism toward utilitarian (hedonic) appeals.

Drawing on embodied cognition and construal level theory, the authors conduct three studies to investigate how consumers form varying distance perceptions and attitudes toward advertising appeals depending on whether they open or close their eyes while contemplating the messages. In Study 1, the authors tested the effects of an advertisement featuring utilitarian versus hedonic appeals in a food waste reduction campaign. In Study 2, the authors tested the effects of an advertisement stressing utilitarian versus hedonic aspects of a brand of travel products. In Study 3, the authors tested the effects of an advertisement for hotel reward products depending on consumption motivations.

The studies support the hypothesis by showing that when individuals close their eyes, they form abstract processing styles (high-level construal), perceive events as more distant and increase preferences for utilitarian advertising appeals; when they open their eyes, they form concrete processing styles (low-level construal), perceive events as nearer and indicate preferences for hedonic advertising appeals.

The novel insight of this study shows how bodily sensations may affect various types of hedonic and utilitarian advertising appeals. This study contributes to the embodied cognition and construal level literature, but the contribution of this study is particularly important for marketers and advertisers in that the authors show interactions between open or closed eyes, hedonic or utilitarian product aspects and processing styles.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects of pre-existing mood valence, mood arousal and ad-evoked arousal on response to television and print advertising. It combined the arousal-as-information and arousal regulation approaches into a single arousal congruence theory. It sought an extended application of arousal congruence theory in the persuasion domain with several novel findings.

Four experiments were conducted to test the hypotheses. Analysis of variance, multivariate analysis of variance and pairwise comparison were used for data analysis.

Consumer judgment is a joint function of mood valence, mood arousal and ad-evoked arousal. Positive mood does not always generate more positive evaluations and vice versa. Ad-evoked arousal can more strongly influence consumers’ judgments when they are in a negative rather than a positive mood. Furthermore, consumers in a positive mood rate a target more favorably when the ad-evoked arousal level is congruent with their current arousal state, while those in a negative mood rate a target more favorably when the ad-evoked arousal level is incongruent with their current state of arousal. Arousal polarization intensifies such congruence (and incongruence) effects.

The findings reveal a mood-lifting opportunity based on ad-evoked arousal. This has implications for the design of advertisements, promotional materials, marketing campaigns and retailing environments.

This paper’s findings highlight unexpected effects of stimulus-evoked arousal in persuasion when consumers are exposed to multiple emotional cues from the environment. The paper demonstrates the utility of an integrated model, explaining the relative importance of valence and arousal in influencing consumer judgments. It has been the first to examine arousal congruence, arousal polarization and arousal regulation mechanisms jointly.

This paper seeks to examine whether violence embedded in stories in ads can contribute to advertising effectiveness along the same lines as well‐researched ad elements such as the celebrity endorser and the physically attractive ad model. More specifically, the paper aims to assess whether violent content in an ad story adds to excitement perceptions and to overall evaluations such as the attitude toward the ad and the attitude toward the advertised product.

The paper uses an experimental approach comprising two studies in which participants were randomly allocated to ads with different levels of violence in an ad story.

The main finding is that representations of real violence (as opposed to staged violence) produced higher levels of excitement, attitude toward the story, attitude toward the ad, and attitude toward the advertised product compared with no violence. Such effects, however, were moderated by the level of congruence between the ad story and the advertised product; the highest response levels were obtained for ads with violent story content dealing explicitly with the advertised product.

The finding that violent stories in ads can have a positive charge is consonant with the assumption that violence is a narrative device that may heighten the excitement created by a story. It is also in accord with the observation that many consumers appear to relish stories with a violent content. Yet the main finding challenges existing research on violent ads in which violence consists of an image visually co‐exposed with a brand – and it questions the dominant approach in media violence research, which emphasizes the negative effects of media violence.

Grounded in uses and gratifications (U&G) theory and relying on the congruence/incongruence approaches, the current research aims to contribute to the study of interactive marketing by measuring the effectiveness of social and personal sponsored post message appeals on consumer psychological and behavioral engagement. A conceptual framework is suggested.

Data were collected during a field experiment conducted on Facebook, consisting of two sponsored Facebook post campaigns, followed by a survey distributed to consumers who were exposed to the experiment.

A structural path model suggests that the congruence of the social message appeal of sponsored Facebook posts leads directly to psychological engagement that follows affective response. This path elevates an indirect effect toward behavioral engagement. Additionally, it was found that the incongruence of the personal message appeal of sponsored Facebook posts leads directly to behavioral engagement.

The novelty of the current research focuses on the unexplored subject of sponsored Facebook post message appeal effectiveness. Based on U&G theory applied to social media and the (in)congruence approaches, the study suggests a new dichotomy of message appeal for digital advertising, i.e. social vs. personal message strategies. Consumer engagement with the two appeals adds value to theory and practice by conceptualizing the effect of sponsored post content strategies on consumer engagement in Facebook while incorporating ad content with a hierarchical process.

The purpose of this study is to examine whether the context of ad pictures differs between Chinese ads and US ads and whether it can influence consumers' ad attitudes.

An ad content analysis and a laboratory experiment were conducted to test the hypotheses.

Findings suggest that contextualized ads appear more frequently in Chinese magazines because East Asians have a context‐dependent mode of thinking while westerners have a context‐independent mode of thinking. However, the effect of culture on advertising is moderated by product class (goods vs service), product category, and magazine category. Moreover, East Asians prefer contextualized ads to non‐contextualized ones, while westerners prefer non‐contextualized ads to contextualized ads. However, the effect of culture on ad attitudes may be moderated by ad involvement.

The limitations of this study stem from its being based on ad samples from China and its use of students to test ad attitudes.

The findings allow managers to better determine whether and under what conditions to use contextualized or non‐contextualized advertisements.

The study's examination of the effect of culture on the context of ad format and effect of context on persuasion in this context constitutes a unique and valuable contribution to the literature. The paper also contributes much to the literature by checking cultural differences across 17 magazine categories, compared to the vast majority of studies analyzing ad content between eastern and western cultures, which have been based on ads from only a few sources.