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This paper aims to analyse how children behave during a purchasing process in a simulated shop and how they put their goals into effect at the Point of Sale (POS). The focus of this research is children in Germany aged between 8 and 10 years. The results reveal answers to the following questions: which criteria do the children consider important when buying groceries? How efficiently and effectively do children pursue the goals demanded of them at the POS? This knowledge can support parents, teachers and educational organisations in teaching children consumer literacy.

Data were collected through interviews and a subsequent observation of the behaviour in a purchase simulation. A total of 436 school children aged 8 to 10 years answered a questionnaire about their behaviour at the POS and perceived demands during the purchasing process as well as their understanding of purchase-relevant concepts. Subsequently, purchase behaviour and decisions in a digitally simulated shopping environment of a supermarket were analysed for a subsample (n = 170). This combination of methods enables the collection of observable decision-making behaviour as well as of the declarative knowledge and the purchasing habits of the children.

Children often act differently from the way they themselves intended and expected during the purchase decision at the POS. Only a small number of children behaved purposefully, whereas the vast majority was distracted by the great amount of stimuli in the simulated supermarket. The results reveal factors that helped children cope with the shopping task and shielded them against purchase impulses from the stimuli at the POS.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to combine questionnaires about children’s declarative knowledge of the shopping process with observation of the real decision behaviour in a supermarket simulation task.

This study aims to examine the ability of the social influence heuristics framework to capture skillful and creative social media influencer (SMI) marketing in long-form video content on YouTube for influencer-owned brands and products.

The theoretical lens was a framework of seven evidence-based social influence heuristics (reciprocity, social proof, consistency, scarcity, liking, authority and unity). For the methodological lens, a qualitative case study approach was applied to a purposeful sample of 6 SMIs and 15 videos on YouTube.

The evidence shows that self-promotional influencer marketing in long-form video content is relatable to all seven heuristics and shows signs of high elaboration, innovativeness and skillfulness.

The study reveals that a heuristic-based account of self-promotional influencer marketing in long-form video content can greatly contribute to the understanding of how various well-established marketing concepts (e.g. source attractivity) might be expressed in real-world communications and behaviors. Based on this improved, in-depth understanding, current research efforts, such as experimental studies using one video with a more or less arbitrary influencer and pre-post measure, are advised to explore research questions via designs that account for the observed subtle and complex nature of real-world influencer marketing in long-form video content.

This structured account of skillful and creative marketing can be used as educational and instructive material for influencer marketing practitioners to enhance their creativity, for consumers to increase their marketing literacy and for policymakers to rethink policies for influencer marketing.

Prior research has created a body of knowledge on influencer marketing. However, a conceptual disconnect has hampered the advancement of the field. The social influence heuristics framework is a highly functional conceptual bridge that links the qualitative and quantitative evidence and will advance the understanding of influencer marketing more effectively.

The purpose of this paper is to explore what characterizes cyberbullying when it is performed in digital space and in an increasingly boundary blurred working life context.

Cyberbullying is explored through the lens of Erving Goffman’s theories on everyday life interaction and social media scholars understanding of social life on the internet today. The empirical material for the study is grounded in eight in-depth interviews with individuals who have been subjected to cyberbullying behavior in their professional life. The interview data were analyzed by means of thematic analysis.

Three key themes were identified: spatial interconnectedness, colliding identities and the role of the audience. The empirical data indicate that in order to understand cyberbullying in working life, it is necessary to consider the specific context that emerges with social network sites and blogs. Moreover, this study shows how social network sites tend to blur boundaries between the private and the professional for the targeted individual.

Cyberbullying in working life is a relatively under-researched area. Most existing research on cyberbullying follows the tradition of face-to-face bullying by addressing the phenomenon with quantitative methods. Given the limited potential of this approach to uncover new and unique features, this study makes an important contribution by exploring cyberbullying with a qualitative approach that provides in-depth understanding of the new situations that emerge when bullying is performed online.

The purpose of this study is to examine how children and young adults form attitudes toward food products in unbranded gaming mobile applications and the degree to which product category attitudes can generate responses to brands in the category through the generalization process.

Two experiments exposed children and young adults to mobile games featuring food products in a between-subjects treatment versus control design to examine both affective responses and belief formation toward food brands within the category.

It was found that both children and young adults favored branded food items in the product category after playing with an unbranded mobile game assembling food products. Young adults also developed specific beliefs about nonrepresented brands in the category, which were found to be stronger under high involvement. Parents and public policymakers must be vigilant in controlling access to food-related games, even when they are not commercial in nature because of the attitudes and beliefs formed in unbranded games.

This research demonstrates that attitudes and beliefs around food brands can be formed through unbranded game play when children and young adults generalize attitudes. Because of the emphasis on “advergames,” no studies have examined the impact of unbranded games on children and young adults through the generalization process.