Public Relations Division

2022 Abstracts

Research Paper • Faculty • Award submission: Doug Newsome • Public Relations and Sustainability across the African Continent: Using Afro-Centric Philosophies to Remember What’s Been ‘Forgotten or Lost’ • Donnalyn Pompper, university of oregon; Eric Kwame Adae, Drake University • Assuring sustainability across the African continent – the cradle of humankind – is an ethical public relations responsibility. There is insufficient research about public relations as a tool for supporting sustainability goals across the world’s second-largest and second-most populous continent (Volk, 2017); one that the rest of the planet relies upon for forests serving as “lungs of the world” (Fleshman, 2008). To begin filling the gap, we address challenges of making sustainability happen here, given a long history of negative colonial and neocolonial forces operating in many of Africa’s nations. Despite these impediments, enduring are indigenous, pre-colonial Afro-centric philosophies of communalism/collectivism and harmony with the natural environment that support sustainability efforts. We interrogate six indigenous philosophies which resonate with values that make contemporary public relations ethical. We discuss why professional public relations shaped by Afro-centric philosophies is welcomed, globally, and is critical for addressing sustainability across the continent.

Research Paper • Student • Award submission: Doug Newsome • From Saving Face to Saving Lives: Prioritizing the Public in Public Relations • Erika Schneider, University of Missori • Traditional crisis communication literature emphasizes how organizations use communication to protect reputation by shifting attributions of crisis responsibility. The purpose of this study is to reevaluate this approach by comparing proposed framework strategies that serve to protect stakeholders with reputational messaging. Findings from this between-subjects experimental design study provide insight on how informed organizational decision-making, such as corrective action and organizational learning, can reduce feelings of anger while prioritizing stakeholder wellbeing in public relations.

Research Paper • Student • Award submission: Race & Public Relations • Racism and Social Issues Management: Examining State Universities’ Responses to the Killing of George Floyd • Drew T. Ashby-King, University of Maryland • Colleges and universities are social institutions often called on speak about social issues, such as responding to instances of racism on campus. Critics have suggested that when responding instances of racism on their campus, institutional leaders often ignore the racist act and harm caused and focus their discourse on diversity and inclusion. Considering this critique, this study used social issues management as a framework to explore how state flagship universities in the United States (U.S.) responded to an instance of racism that did not occur on their campuses. A qualitative analysis of all 50 U.S. state flagship universities’ initial public statement in response to the police killing of George Floyd led to three key findings: (1) institutions were made to speak on the issue by larger social discourse; (2) through their statements institutions (re)defined the issue as one of diversity and inclusion rather than racism and police brutality; and (3) guided by the logic of whiteness institutions legitimized their definition of the issue. Based on these findings, I argue that the initial conceptualization of social issues management did not adequality consider the power organizations have to define social issues through their discourse. Therefore, I conclude by suggesting an approach to social issues management that centers those most effected by the issue in order to promote social justice.

Research Paper • Student • Award submission: Race & Public Relations • Rethinking cultural factors in government communication: A survey of environmental professionals working for indigenous governments • Ryan Comfort, Indiana University • This study examined the use of and attitudes towards communication media by environmental and natural resource management personnel employed by indigenous nations in the U.S. Survey data on professionals’ use of media, attitudes, and perceived obstacles to better use of media for science & environmental communication revealed that concerns about sharing cultural ecological information may carry significant weight in the communication decision making process of indigenous environmental agencies.

Research Paper • Faculty • Award submission: Race & Public Relations • The Hybrid Firestorm: A Qualitative Study of Black Lives Matter Activism and the COVID-19 Pandemic • Tiffany Gallicano, UNC Charlotte; Olivia Lawless; Abagail Higgins; Samira Shaikh; Sara Levens • The combination of a global pandemic and an ignited social justice movement has created a saturated digital environment in which people turn to social media to navigate a hybrid firestorm fueled by both the Black Lives Matter movement and the COVID-19 pandemic. Although the circuit of culture has been studied in the context of a pandemic (Curtin & Gaither, 2006) and digital activism (Han & Zhang, 2009), research using any theoretical model to study a hybrid firestorm could not be found. This study consists of interviews with 25 participants involving their experiences in the hybrid firestorm. The circuit of culture is used, which is a model composed of five moments, to explore how meaning is created, interpreted, and contested in the context of a social justice movement and a global pandemic.

Research Paper • Faculty • Award submission: Race & Public Relations • Discriminated Against but Engaged: The Role of Communicative Behaviors of Racial Minority Employees • Yeunjae Lee, University of Miami; Jo-Yun Li • Grounded in the situational theory of problem-solving (STOPS), two survey studies investigated how racial minority employees in the U.S. perceive and communicate about the discriminatory situation within their organizations and how it affects their engagement levels. In Study 1 (N = 461), experiences and observance of both formal and informal discriminatory acts at work reduced racial minority employees’ engagement level, while their situational perceptions increased their communicative behaviors toward direct supervisor and peers, respectively. Communicative behaviors with supervisors, not peers, in turn, increased their engagement. Study 2 (N = 454) replicated and extended Study 1 in different contexts, revealing the moderating role of a diverse climate in increasing racial minority employees’ problem and involvement recognition and decreasing their constraint recognition about workplace discrimination situation. Theoretical and practical implications for race in public relations are discussed.

Research Paper • Faculty • Award submission: Race & Public Relations • Silence Has No Place A Framing Analysis of Corporate Sociopolitical Activism Statements • Yvette Sterbenk, Ithaca College; Jamie Ward, EMU; Regina Luttrell; Summer Shelton, Idaho State University • This study used a quantitative framing analysis to examine the company statements delivered by 105 Fortune 500 companies across 21 sectors in June 2020 in response to three social justice issues that took prominence that month in the United States: Black Lives Matter, immigration laws, and LGBTQ rights. The study uncovered which companies and sectors did not make statements, and, among those that did, what messages were most common.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Serving Public Interests and Enacting Organizational Values: An Examination of Public Interest Relations through AARP’s Tele-Town Halls • Lindsey Anderson, University of Maryland • Public interest relations (PIR) is an approach to public relations scholarship and practice that contributes to the social good by integrating the concept of public interest into organizational goals and values. The need for PIR was emphasized during the COVID-19 pandemic as publics looked to organizations for information about a variety of topics (e.g., symptoms, vaccines). AARP created a series of tele-townhalls to communicate with its publics, who are considered to be members of a “vulnerable population” during the pandemic. In order to understand how AARP’s Coronavirus Tele-Town Halls reflected the practices of PIR, I completed a critical thematic analysis of 28 virtual sessions that were hosted in 2020-2021. The analysis, which was guided by the tenets of PIR, found that AARP’s communication (1) highlighted common life course milestones of its publics, (2) emphasized the quality of the information, and (3) provided avenues to engage with the organization and its experts. Based on these findings, I developed theoretical implications that reflect a critical perspective on PIR and suggest future research avenues that seek to build this ethical and socially meaningful approach to public relations.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Understanding the implementation of Enterprise Social Media on Employee Communication: An Affordance Perspective • Song AO, University of Macau; XIAO QIAN, University of Macau • The research adopts the technological affordance approach to examine the role of enterprise social media (ESM) in employee communication in the context of mainland China. The research postulated that organizations can actualize affordances of ESM to achieve certain goals. Using Enterprise WeChat (EWeChat) as the example, the research interviewed 37 participants to explore organizational goals and actions of EWeChat affordance actualization in mainland China. Thirteen EWeChat affordances and means of actualization (i.e., association, control, diversity, feedback, outeraction, perpetual contact, persistence, personalization, portability, privacy, social presence, synchronicity, and visibility) for specific organizational goals were identified. The research explicates ESM affordance actualization as the interaction between ESM and organizations, and also between ESM and employees. The research sheds light on how organizations in mainland China can effectively configure their ESM for certain purposes of its mobile application in employee communication.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Relational Tensions and Publics during Disasters: Investigating Organizational Relationships Ethnographically • Anita Atwell Seate, University of Maryland; Brooke Liu, University of Maryland; Samantha Stanley; Yumin Yan; Allison Chatham, University of Maryland • Relationships are essential for a fully functioning society. Through a multi-sited rapid ethnography, we show how organizations achieve their mission through organizational partners and active publics in the context of disasters. We provide insights into relational tensions that occur in organization-public relationships (OPRs) and how communication can address those relational tensions. In doing so, we answer calls for broadening methodologies to examine OPRs. Overall, we demonstrate the value of continuing to theorize the network approach.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Exploring Online Opinion Leadership: An Analysis of the Influential Users on Twitter During the Online Conversation Around Anthem Protests by Prominent Athletes • Brandon Boatwright • The current study explores the role of online opinion leaders on Twitter in conversations around anthem protests by prominent athletes. The aim of the study is twofold: (1) identify the influential opinion leaders in Twitter conversations related to Colin Kaepernick and Megan Rapinoe, and (2) further understand how and why social media users participate in conversations online about controversial subjects. Ultimately, results from this study extend the network paradigm in public relations research by examining the role of individual users in the construction of a discursive landscape of issue networks. The study combines social network analysis with in-depth interviews in order to adopt a more wholistic framework for studying online opinion leadership in the context of public relations research.

Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • Extended abstract: Promoting diversity and inclusion: How Fortune 500 companies talk about diversity on Twitter • Denise Bortree, Penn State University; Michail Vafeiadis; Pratiti Diddi, Lamar University; Ryan Wang • This study examines more than 11,000 tweets on diversity topics posted by Fortune 500 companies in 2019. It identifies the 18 most common topics in six general areas – workplace diversity/inclusion, gender/women, sexual orientation, race/ethnicity, disability and activism. Corporations with higher CSR ratings tend to post more diversity-related tweets. Analysis suggests that companies tend to use different topics in original posts and retweets/replies/comments on diversity. Engagement rates on diversity topics vary widely.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Extending civic values in architectures of listening: Arendt, Mouffe and the pluralistic imperative for organizational listening • Luke Capizzo, James Madison University; Meredith Feinman • This conceptual paper introduces the concept of civic listening to augment organizational listening theory and practice. Drawing from the writing of Arendt and Mouffe, it centers pluralism, agonism, deliberation, and reflection as central to listening and delineates the functions and values of civic listening to add to existing architectures. This new perspective points toward deeper, more nuanced, and more equitable organizational engagement in civic discourse and firmer ground for contentious issue engagement.

Extended Abstract • Member • Open Competition • Extended Abstract: Toward an Audience-Centric Framework of Situational Corporate Social Advocacy Strategy: A pilot study • Ioana Coman, Texas Tech University; Jiun-Yi Tsai, Northern Arizona University; Shupei Yuan, Northern Illinois University • Increasingly companies engage in Corporate Social Advocacy or Political Activism. Yet how publics expect companies to take a stance (sometimes even action) on controversial issues remains unclear. We propose an audience-centric approach to investigate how audiences expect companies to act on hot button issues and their reasoning process, through a mixed-method analysis of a survey (N=388) conducted at a public University. Results highlight a need to further understand CSA from audience perceptions.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Exploring the Mediating Effect of Government–Public Relationships during the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Model Comparison Approach • Yuan Wang, City University of Hong Kong; Yi-Hui Christine Huang, City University of Hong Kong; Qinxian Cai, City University of Hong Kong • This study proposed, tested, and compared two models to examine the antecedent and outcome of government–public relationships during the COVID-19 pandemic. It conducted three surveys of 9,675 publics in Mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. It found that publics’ perceived governmental responsiveness leads to their satisfaction with and trust in the government, which influence their word-of-mouth intention about the vaccines. Furthermore, relational satisfaction and trust mediate the relationship between perceived responsiveness and word-of-mouth intention.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • A Comparison of Twitter Use by Different Sector Organizations • Taisik Hwang, Suffolk University • “Given the shifting nature of communication environment, this study attempts to discover how leading nature education organizations utilize social media to effectively reach and build relationship with their audiences. Specifically, it employed a content analysis to examine how the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), U.S. National Park Service (NPS), and National Geographic (NG) take advantage of Twitter to better communicate with their external publics. Out of a total of 6,286 tweets sent by these organizations for a six-month period from January to June 2018, a random sample was used for quantitative analysis. Findings show that there are significant differences in these organizations’ use of message functions as well as mentioning of brand names associated with them. For example, both UNESCO and NPS tend to focus on building community with their external stakeholders, whereas NG’s tweets mainly involves the information function. The current study

will benefit other non-profit organizations by revealing ways in which these organizations purposefully use social media to fulfill their mission and suggesting practical guidelines to strategic communicators in public-sector organizations.”

Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • Feeling elevated: Examine the mediation role of elevation in CEO activism on employee prosocial engagement • Grace Ji, Boston University; Cheng Hong, California State University Sacramento • With a survey of 600 U.S. employees, this study investigated the effect of authentic leadership on employees’ prosocial advocacy engagement in the context of CEO activism. Employees’ moral elevation and organizational identification were examined as mediators. Results showed authentic leadership elicited employees’ positive emotion of elevation and enhanced their identification with the company. In turn, employees’ affective (elevation) and cognitive (organizational identification) responses mediated authentic leadership’s impact on motivating employees’ activism participation.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Influence of identification, relationship, and involvement of a donor on attitudes towards and behavioral intentions to online donation via SNS • Eunyoung Kim, Auburn University at Montgomery; Sung Eun Park, Webster University • This study seeks what factors predict publics’ behavioral intentions to online donate and share words via social media. Relevant literature was reviewed, and an online survey was conducted to examine hypotheses. The results show that identification, involvement, perceived credibility, and attitudes towards online donation predict intention to donate via social media, while attitudes towards helping others, identification, involvement, and site features affect the intention of Word-of-Mouth. Theoretical and practical implications are presented in the discussion and conclusion.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Public Expectations of Government Pandemic-Crisis Communication What and How to Communicate during the COVID-19 Pandemic • Sora Kim, The Chinese University of Hong Kong • Through two representative online surveys in Hong Kong (HK) and the U.S. (US) during the COVID-19 pandemic, this study investigates, from a public-centric perspective, public expectations of effective government pandemic-crisis communication. It looks specifically at what publics want to be communicated in times of a global pandemic and how. In each region, the findings identify four significant dimensions. Three are culturally universal dimensions—basic responsibility, locus of pandemic-crisis responsibility, and disfavor of promotional tone. The fourth is culture-specific—personal relevance for HK and frequency for the US. Among the significant dimensions, the most highly expected is what people consider government’s basic responsibility in pandemic communication, that is, a basic responsibility dimension. This includes providing instructing and adjusting information and securing accuracy, timeliness, and transparency in pandemic communication. In both regions, respondents preferred by far traditional media and non-governmental sources to social media and governmental sources.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Revisiting SMCC Model: How Chinese Public Relations Practitioners Handle Social Mediated Crisis • Sining Kong, Texas A & M University at Corpus Christi; Huan Chen, University of Florida • As social media is widely used by Chinese organizations, this study comprehensively examines how Chinese public relations practitioners cope with social mediated crisis and how culture interacts with social mediated crisis response. An in-depth interview was used to collect data from twenty-three Chinese public relations practitioners, who had experience in dealing with crises and issues via social media. Results showed that Chinese public relations practitioners use diverse social media platforms to satisfy the publics’ gratifications and social media usage preferences. Besides, results also showed the importance of matching information form and information source in responding social mediated crisis. Furthermore, it revealed how the uniqueness of Chinese culture moderated Chinese public relations social mediated crisis response, such as maintaining harmony and avoiding direct confrontation, collaborating with opinion leaders and influencers to shape publics’ opinions, using no response, apologizing, and self-mockery, and emphasizing the importance of media relations.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Social Listening using Machine Learning to Understand Sense Making and Content Dissemination on Twitter: A Case Study of WHO’s Social Listening Strategy During COVID-19 Initial Phase • Sushma Kumble, Towson University; Pratiti Diddi, Lamar University; Maggie Whitescarver • The study utilized unsupervised machine learning techniques to the CERC framework on 6.1 Million Tweets between January to March 2020 to understand the sensemaking process during COVID-19 among Twitter users. The study also used content analysis to examine WHO’s response to the popular emerging conversations. Results indicate that while WHO’s messaging addressed the dominant topics during the timeframe but did not effectively address misinformation. The paper discusses the implications and recommendations for health communication practitioners.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Global Companies’ Use of Social Media for CSR Communication During COVID-19 • Sun Young Lee, University of Maryland–College Park; Duli Shi, University of Maryland; John Leach; Saymin Lee; Cody Buntain, New Jersey Institute of Technology • The purpose of the study was to examine how companies have communicated their efforts to address COVID-19 on Facebook and Twitter and to evaluate the effectiveness of their message strategies. We conducted a content analysis of 992 Facebook posts and 1,957 tweets between March 11 and May 20, 2020, from the 2020 RepTrak’s 100 most reputable companies. About one-third of the messages (n = 1,059) were related to companies’ responses to COVID-19. Companies mostly highlighted CSR efforts related to their expertise, partnership efforts, or financial resources. The majority of messages did not specify a particular group’s interests, but when they did, the most impacted groups, such as frontline personnel and employees, were addressed. Companies mostly used social media to employ one-way message strategies, but incorporating multimedia and expressing appreciation to others were found to be effective message strategies for engaging publics emotionally. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • What do you mean by doing the right thing?: Examining corporate social advocacy frames and transparency efforts in Fortune 500 companies’ website • Hyunmin Lee, Drexel University; Emma Whitehouse, Drexel University • This study examined the state of corporate social advocacy (CSA) initiatives among Fortune 500 companies via a content analysis of their official websites. There is a need to critically examine the ways in which CSA is communicated to create a normative understanding as to what constitutes of ethical and transparent CSA communication. Findings showed that episodic frames were popularly utilized to communicate about CSA and transparency efforts varied according to CSA type and location.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • How Nike and Gillette Survived the Tension between Corporate Social Advocacy and Boycotting Backlash • Juan Liu, Columbus State University; Bruce Getz, Columbus State University • Both 2018 Nike’s Colin Kaepernick and 2019 Gillette commercial campaigns received backlash on social media over their messages addressing controversial social-political issues. Drawing on legitimacy theory, this study examines how polarized boycotting and advocating messages on Twitter affect interactive engagement and perceptions of corporate social advocacy. In both Nike and Gillette conditions, individuals who expressed strong value alignment with brands’ campaigns, were more susceptible to be affected by polarized tweets. When evaluating brands’ motivations for corporate social advocacy, results showed that individuals with weak value alignment were more likely to be affected by polarized messages. However, this pattern is only found in the Gillette condition. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • Public Perceptions of Using the Wireless Emergency Alert System for COVID-19: Lessons for State Government Crisis Communication • Stephanie Madden, Penn State University; Nicholas Eng, Penn State University; Jessica Myrick, Penn State University • On November 25, 2020, the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency (PEMA) sent out a COVID-19 public health message via the Wireless Emergency Alert system. Using survey (N = 212) and interview (N = 19) research, this study sought to understand the targeted publics’ reaction to this message and factors impacting potential behavior change after receiving this message. Because COVID-19 response has relied on state governments, this research provides important findings for government communicators at the state level.

Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • Communicating the Big Picture with Employees: The Impacts of CEO Vision Communication on Employee Engagement • Yufan “Sunny” Qin, University of Florida; Alexis Fitzsimmons, University of Florida; Eve Heffron, University of Florida; Marcia DiStaso, University of Florida • Communicating an organizational vision with employees can be critical to help employees internalize the vision, which might in turn increase their willingness to get engaged with the work and subsequently achieving higher goals. The aim of this study is to examine whether and how CEO vision communication could influence employee engagement. This study also proposes employees’ perceptions of work meaningfulness and organizational identification as the potential underlying mechanism that mediate the relationship between CEO vision communication and employee engagement. An online survey was conducted with employees across various industries in the U.S.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Internal Activism at Amazon: Rhetorical Strategies and the Public Relations Response • Margaret Ritsch, Washington State University; Erin Tomson, Washington State University • “This study examined the public relations response to employee activism at Amazon during the Covid-19 pandemic. Public relations has typically been examined from a functional perspective, which largely ignores the power dynamics between an organization and its employees, who are important stakeholders that contribute to the organization’s public image. Critical theory provides a useful lens to examine the dynamics of organizational power and control, although this approach has typically been applied to the study of internal communication dynamics. The study addresses this gap by using a critical rhetorical approach to examine Amazon’s response to employee activism. Researchers conducted qualitative content analysis of news media coverage and Amazon’s company content (e.g. websites and public statements). The data indicates that Amazon spokespeople used aggressive rhetorical strategies in their communication with and about employee activists that discouraged unionization and ultimately attempted to prevent current and former Amazon employees from speaking up about their experiences working for the company.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Unpack the Relational and Behavioral Outcomes of Internal CSR: Highlighting Dialogic Communication and Managerial Facilitation • Baobao Song; Weiting Tao • The current study examines how corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication and management contributes to internal public relationship building and employees’ megaphoning behaviors. Specifically, it investigates how organization-public dialogical communication (OPDC) about CSR and the organizational leaders’ facilitation behavior towards employee CSR engagement influence employees’ perceptions of two different distinct types of organization-public relationships (OPRs), i.e., communal and exchange relationships. Structural equation modeling results of 660 on-line survey responses suggest that OPDC has a positive association with communal relationship and negative association with exchange relationship. Facilitation behavior positively contributes to employee exchange relationships. Both communal and exchange relationships are positively associated with employees’ positive megaphoning. Whereas negative megaphoning is negatively linked with communal relationships and positively linked with employees’ exchange relationships with the companies. This study contributes to the growing body of literature on internal CSR communication and management. More importantly, this study uncovers nuanced effects of CSR on internal public communal and exchange relationship building.

Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • EXTENDED ABSTRACT: Public Communication in the Age of Fake News • Edson Tandoc Jr; Pei Wen Wong, Nanyang Technological; Chen Lou; Hyunjin Kang, Wee Kim Wee School of Communication & Information, Nanyang Technological U; Shruti Malviya, Wee Kim Wee School of Communication & Information, Nanyang Technological U • The rise of fake news has posed threats to societies around the world, affecting various institutions. One area that has not been sufficiently explored is how it has affected public communication. This study examines how the rise of fake news has affected the roles, resources, and routines of public communicators in Singapore. Through in-depth interviews, this research explores how various communication officers across Singapore’s government agencies perceive, and respond to, the fake news crisis.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • The role of community and social capital in community building • Brooke Witherow, Hood College • While the role of social capital in community building has been discussed previously, the terms community and community building are rarely defined (e.g. Dodd et al., 2015; Jin & Lee, 2013; Sommerfeldt 2013a, 2013b). This qualitative case study examines the role of community and social capital in community building through community policing. 26 semi-structured interviews with police administration, patrol officers, and community leaders were conducted. The interviews with patrol officers occurred during seven ride-alongs.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Examining Value Congruence and Outcome-relevant involvement as Antecedents of Corporate Political Advocacy • Leping You; Linda Hon, University of Florida; Yu-Hao Lee • Drawing from the theoretical foundation of corporate political advocacy (CPA), this study aims to understand value congruence and outcome-relevant involvement as the antecedents of CPA that companies should consider when taking a stance on contentious sociopolitical issues. This study conducted a 2 x 2 online experiment to examine how both antecedents affect consumers’ attitudinal evaluation on the credibility and legitimacy of a CPA and predict consumers’ supportive behavioral intentions toward a CPA.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Navigating change in the Era of COVID-19: The Role of Top Leaders’ Charismatic Rhetoric and Employees’ Organizational Identification • April YUE, University of Connecticut • “The Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has had tremendous and swift effects on organizational change. This study examined how organizations can leverage leadership and employee resources to facilitate positive change outcomes. Drawing from the self-concept based motivational theory of charismatic leadership and substitutes for leadership theory, the current study proposed a theoretical model connecting top leaders’ charismatic rhetoric, employees’ affective commitment to change, and employees’ turnover intention. Furthermore, the study investigated contingencies that may modify the relationship between leadership communication and followers’ outcomes. Results from an online panel of 417 U.S. employees showed that top leaders’ use of charismatic rhetoric during change led to followers’ affective commitment to change, which decreased their turnover intention. Furthermore, employees’ organizational identification moderated this relationship. When employees have low identification with their organizations, top leaders’ charismatic rhetoric to address the immediate change is more needed.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • The influence of issue attitude on consumers’ reaction toward corporate social advocacy: A moderated mediation path through cognitive dissonance • Xueying Zhang, North Carolina A&T State; Ziyuan Zhou, Bentley University • Corporate social advocacy (CSA) has gained increasing attention in public relations research. The psychological mechanisms regarding how consumers react to a CSA position that conflicts with their own have not yet been examined. Employing cognitive dissonance theory, this study examines how consumers’ preexisting attitude toward an issue influences their reaction to CSA through cognitive dissonance. An experiment (study1) and a survey (study 2) were conducted on Qualtrics with participants recruited from MTurk. Gay marriage rights and gun control issue were chosen as the CSA topics. The results indicated that a conflict between a consumer’s preexisting attitude and a corporation’s stance on a controversial issue leads to cognitive dissonance. Dissonance mediates consumers’ responses to counter-attitudinal CSA, in terms of perceiving the company as biased and intending to boycott the company. Value involvement and CCI significantly moderated the effect of consumers’ attitudes toward CSA on cognitive dissonance, but the effect varies between the two issues. The results help PR practitioners to better understand the segmented consumer audiences and provide a few pieces of practical advice to minimize the potential risk of expressing advocacy on a position of a controversial social political issue.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Matching words with actions: Understanding the effects of CSA stance-action consistency on negative consumer responses • Ziyuan Zhou, Bentley University; Chuqing Dong, Michigan State University • Corporation social advocacy (CSA) is a popular topic in public relations research. However, few studies have considered the issue of consistency between corporations taking a stance on a controversial issue and acting accordingly. This study proposed a new concept, CSA stance-action consistency, to investigate the negative consumer responses when corporations violate their CSA promises. A 4 × 2 between-subject experiment indicated that CSA stance-action consistency significantly predicted negative word-of-mouth and boycott intentions. Besides, social issue activism moderated such an effect, while CSA record did not. This study added one more piece of evidence on the risks of CSA and encouraged corporations to fully understand stakeholders’ expectations of CSA before getting involved with controversial issues.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • How China used Twitter to Repair Its Image amid the COVID-19 Crisis • Ayman Alhammad, University of Kansas • “In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, many countries have suffered in different ways politically, economically, and socially because of this health crisis. China registered the first case of COVID-19 and found itself the recipient of negative publicity, some of which, stated by scientists, blamed China for the virus in a Wuhan laboratory, or covered the nature of the disease until it was out of control (Verma, 2020). Because of comprehensive widely negative consequences, China’s image has been distorted in many countries. That led the Chinese government to use a different medium to deal with the crisis, one of which is social media platforms. As Saudi Arabia is one of China’s important economic partners, Beijing is concerned that health crises could affect negatively its economic interests in Saudi Arabia. In fact, China has faced serious obstacles in terms of import and export goods (Hayakawa & Mukunoki, 2021).

China decided to employ digital diplomacy by making its ambassadors communicate with the local and international communities (Brandt & Schafer, 2020). Chinese ambassador, Chen Weiqing, speaks to Saudis via Twitter as Saudi Arabia is ranked eighth in the world with 12.45 million users (Statista, 2020). This paper examines the image repair strategies that the Chinese ambassador in Saudi Arabia employed during the coronavirus pandemic to restore China’s image there. This study adopted rhetorical analysis, building on the theoretical framework proposed by Brinson & Benoit (1999).

An examination of the ambassador’s tweets revealed a variety of image restoration strategies, including denial, bolstering, compensation, and minimization.”

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • The Networked Huawei Agendas during the US-China Trade War: The Interrelationships between Huawei, the News Media, and Public Tweets • Zahedur Arman, Southern Illinois University Carbondale • This study examines interrelationships between the networked Huawei agendas, the U.S. and Chinese news media agendas, and Twitter users’ issue agendas on Twitter during the US-China Trade War. Social network analysis is used as a theory and method to analyze Huawei’s public relations activities on Twitter, news media, and Twitter users’ network. This study found that Huawei’s direct networked agenda setting to Twitter users is more successful than the news media’s networked agenda-setting to the Twitter users. This study is among the first to explore cross-nation networked agenda building and networked agenda setting effects on Twitter. It also found that the US media did not follow Huawei’s networked agendas, but the Chinese media followed the corporation’s issue agendas during the US-China trade war. The theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • I Distrust You All Because One of You Did Something Wrong: Spillover Effect of Distrust Elicited by an NPO’s Crisis on Overall NPOs • Bugil Chang, University of Minnesota • This study examined how public distrust formed by the crisis of an NPO spills over to other organizations in the same and different sectors through experiment. Overall, when faced with a crisis, the participants distrusted not only organizations in the same sector as the crisis-stricken organization but also organizations in a different sector. The effect was fully mediated by participants’ perceived distrust toward the crisis-stricken organization.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • From CSR to Employees’ Megaphoning Behavior: The Roles of Communal Relationship and Corporate Reputation • Enzhu Dong, University of Miami; Dongqing Xu • This study examined how employees’ perceived overall CSR activities impact employees’ positive megaphoning through the mediation of employees’ perceived communal relationship and communal willingness, taking the moderation effect of perceived reputation into consideration. To address the hypotheses, a survey among employees across different organizations was conducted. Results of the moderated mediation examination supported the hypotheses. These findings contributed to the understanding of CSR effects on employee communication behavior and provided implications for organizational management.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Examining Publics’ Comparative Evaluations of Government Communication and Strength Ties as Predictors of Country Reputation • Yoosun Ham, Indiana University; Ejae Lee, Indiana University; Eugene Kim, The Media School, Indiana University Bloomington; Sung Hyun Lee • During the COVID-19 outbreak, media tended to report on how different Asian countries — China, Japan, and South Korea — were handling the situation by using comparisons. U.S. citizens have been exposed to information about Asian countries and could compare and evaluate how those countries’ governments communicate with their citizens to help contain the new coronavirus. This study attempted to examine how country reputation could be associated with publics’ comparative evaluations about the dialogic communication competency of a foreign country’s government through news media exposure about how that government contained and/or mitigated the new coronavirus. This study also investigated associations between the perceived tie strength between the U.S. and Asian countries and those countries’ reputations. This study used online experimental surveys. Its findings suggest that country reputation was significantly associated with comparative evaluations about mutuality and openness in Asian countries’ government dialogic communication and perceived tie strength with the U.S. government. Theoretical implications and practical contributions are discussed.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Can CEO Activism be Good for the Organization? The Way CEO Activism on Sexual Orientation Equality Achieves High Young Employee Work Engagement • Jie Jin, University of Florida • “Whether a CEO should speak out about controversial issues is a hotly debated topic across the United States. In today’s politically polarized environment, Americans have changed their expectations about whether companies and CEOs should lead social change. Contrary to the conventional wisdom that CEOs shouldn’t avoid taking actions unrelated to their business, the purpose of this study is to examine how CEOs’ pro-sexual orientation equality statements may lead to young employee work engagement from the perspective of social exchange theory. A conceptual model with nine propositions is proposed to reveal how CEO activism generates positive employee outcomes.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Twitter styles by the leaders of the 116th US House: A concurrent triangulation • Nana Kwame Osei Fordjour, University of New Mexico; Timothy Kwakye Karikari, University of International Business and Economic, Beijing, China • Situating our study in the context of a global pandemic and a time of seeming polarization in the US, we analyzed the tweets (n = 480) of Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy. We employ the concurrent triangulation approach and blend three theoretical approaches to analyze their credit-claiming behavior, position-taking, attacks as well as the salient frames in their tweets. Findings indicate there is no significant difference in their position-taking and credit-claiming tweets, however, Majority Leader McCarthy tweeted more negatively than Speaker Pelosi. We uncover four salient frames which are: Economic debate, electoral integrity, COVID-19 response, and the appointment of Supreme Court Justice. Ultimately, we juxtapose the qualitative frames with the quantitative findings to give deeper understanding into the three quantitative categories and provide insights into the implications of such tweets.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • How has the United Nations portrayed International Women’s Day before and after founding UN Women? • Michelle Rossi • By applying feminist theory and framing for public relations, this research explored the range of debate within press releases distributed about International Women’s Day before and after the founding of the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, UN Women, in 2011. Using Ethnographic Content Analysis (ECA), this study found that press releases were more descriptive about events in the decade before, and more focused on actions in the decade after.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Different Brands Stealing Thunder: How Brand Personality Impacts Crisis Response Strategy Choice • Dongqing Xu • This study aimed to examine the impact of brand personality on participants’ brand perceptions and crisis response evaluation. To be more specific, the study aimed to examine how stealing thunder (i.e., brands disclosing the crisis and response before revealed by the third-party) as a proactive response strategy could impact brands with different personalities in crises. Employing a 2 (brand personality: sincere vs. exciting) × 2 (crisis response type: proactive vs. reactive) experimental design, the study found the buffering effect of sincere brand personality on participants’ perceived credibility, brand attitude, and purchase intention in crisis. In terms of crisis performance evaluations, brand personality was found moderating the effectiveness of the stealing thunder strategy, such that stealing thunder lost its power when employed by a sincere brand. These findings contributed to the extant brand personality literature and suggested a potential boundary of the stealing thunder strategy.

Research Paper • Faculty • Teaching competition • Teaching Philanthropy: How Can Public Relations Courses Prepare Future Fundraisers and Motivate Giving? • Virginia Harrison, Clemson University • Scholars have suggested that fundraising education is a specialty of public relations. This study examines how a fundraising-specific service-learning project may help prepare future fundraisers. A survey of qualitative and quantitative data was administered to public relations students in a fundraising-focused class and in other service-learning classes. Students in the fundraising-focused class were more knowledgeable about nonprofits but were not more inclined to enter the profession. However, they were more motivated to donate after graduation.

Research Paper • Faculty • Teaching competition • Dynamic Capabilities and Social Media Education: Professional Expectations and Curricular Preparation • KiYong Kim • “When Covid-19 impacted regular communication dynamics for organizations, social media became even more prominent in brand communications. A growing body of research confirms training in social media is an essential part of knowing “”how to”” reach one’s organization’s publics (Kruset et al., 2018; Plowman et al., 2015), making social media a mainstay in the public relations educational curriculum (Meganck et al., 2020). This study seeks to bridge the themes found by Kim (2021) related to public relations practice and dynamic capabilities (Teece, 2007) with social media educational practices. This study suggests that there is a link between dynamic capabilities and social media educational practices.

Research Paper • Faculty • Teaching competition • Leveling the Playing Field: Assessing Issues of Equity, Transparency, and Experiential Learning in the PRSSA Bateman Case Study Competition • Amanda Weed, Kennesaw State University; Adrienne Wallace, Grand Valley State University; Betsy Emmons, Samford University; Alisa Agozzino, Ohio Northern University • This study provides the first academic research examination about the Public Relations Student Society of America Bateman Case Study Competition. Research-based insights identify varying perspectives on if the competition meets current students’ needs. Through insights gained from a survey of faculty and professional advisers of 2017-2020 Bateman competition teams, the authors have identified critical perspectives and areas for improvement to the competition along the issues of equity, transparency, and experiential learning. Study results address alignment of knowledge, skills, and abilities identified by the Commission on Public Relations Education and university curricula.

2022 Abstracts

Advertising Division

2022 Abstracts

Research Paper • Industry Views On Enhancing Digital Advertising • Student • Ritika Agrawal • Advertisers of the industry that were once referred to as “Mad Men” are now incorporating data and becoming the “Math Men.” Marketers’ interest in data and analytics has increased from 8% to 12% in the past five years (Forrester, 2021). However, consumers are often reluctant participants in the use of their personal data for advertising targeting and messaging. This study uses social exchange theory to explore the process through which data are used in digital advertising to improve the e-consumer experience. Through in-depth interviews with executives from leading entertainment and media companies, advertising agencies, and tech firms, the researcher offers three attributes that may improve the ad experience for e-consumers: transparency, relevant and engaging imagery, and frequency of retargeting.

Research Paper • It’s OK to Not Feel OK; Representations of Mental Health in Advertising • Student • Christen Buckley, Pennsylvania State University • COVID-19 has wreaked havoc on mental health in the United States. In response, advertisements are incorporating representations of the mental health crisis. Using textual analysis to evaluate four television advertisements, (two pre COVID, two post COVID) from two brands, HBO and Headspace, this study investigates the key similarities/differences between the pre versus post COVID ads, and the key similarities/differences between the differing brands’ post COVID ads. Implications of mental health representations in advertisements are discussed

Extended Abstract • Advertising During the Pandemic: The Influence of Susceptibility and Severity on “COVID-19 Appeal” Perceptions and Advertising Effectiveness • Student • Colin Piacentine, University of South Carolina • The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between consumer perceptions of COVID-19 and the effects of advertisements using COVID-19 appeals (as defined in this study). Using an online survey, persuasion knowledge, perceived manipulativeness, and attributions (public- or self-serving) will be observed as mediating variables between susceptibly and severity (IVs) and attitudes and behaviors resulting from exposure to the advertisement (DVs). Implication will be discussed.

Research Paper • McAds: Where Collectivism and Culture Collide • Faculty • Sarah Scott, Kennesaw State University; Erin Ryan, Kennesaw State University • Cultural differences can be difficult for people on a personal level, but for a brand it is vital to learn how to understand these differences in order to run a successful business. American fast-food brands have had to learn how to deal with these differences when doing business in China. They struggle between keeping their original standardization from the US and knowing when to implement a more localized plan for their ventures in China. Many fast-food brands have tried and failed to open a successful business in China due to lack of knowledge of Chinese culture. One brand that has successfully integrated themselves into China is McDonald’s, with some people even having “weddings” in them. They appear to have found the balance between standardization, localization, and knowledge of the cultural differences between American individualism and Chinese collectivism. They implemented this knowledge in their marketing and product selection, and this study illustrates this by examining menu differences and advertisements to the Chinese populace. This study helps pave the way for future research into ways in which American brands can successfully market to the Chinese audience.

Research Paper • Humanity for Sale! A Textual Analysis of Zain’s “Mr. President” Commercial • Student • Raghad Sonbul, The University of Southern Mississippi • This paper analyzed media representation of Muslims through a textual analysis of Zain’s commercial in Ramadan 2018. It examines the commercial through the lenses of myths, Marxist theory, and hegemony, as well as Stuart Hall’s levels of analyzing media–“preferred, negotiated and oppositional” readings. The aim of the study was to evaluate the media representation of Muslims from a different perspective than the dominant stereotypes and to examine media effects on audiences. The findings indicated that the commercial was a response to President Trump’s determination that it is time to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, as well as other Arabs issues. The company used the Arab issues to reach millions of people around the world, draw attention and gain profits. However, the commercial raised a debate on social media among supporters and opponents.

Research Paper • When Deception Backfires: Attitudinal and Chilling Effects of Targeted Advertising on Social Media • Student • Marlis Stubenvoll; Alice Binder • The following experiment (N = 340) investigates whether individuals activate three dimensions of persuasion knowledge – perceived persuasive intent, perceived manipulative intent, and targeting knowledge – in response to targeted (versus not targeted) ads and the original sponsorship disclosure (versus no disclosure) on Facebook. Results suggest that individuals’ evaluation of targeted ads as manipulative sparks negative brand evaluations. Moreover, perceptions of manipulative intent could cause chilling effects, through which individuals might restrict their online behaviors.

Extended Abstract • Virtual or Real?: A Comparative Study on Virtual-influencer- vs. Celebrity- endorsed CSR Message • Student • Jeongwon Yang; Ploypin Chuenterawong; Heejae Lee, Syracuse University • Conducting an online experiment with a design of 2×2 between subjects, the study aims to 1) examine the roles of source credibility and source-message fit in enhancing the persuasiveness of messages, by comparing the CSR posts of virtual influencer and celebrity endorsement; and 2) make an interdisciplinary effort to explore an effectiveness of a non-human agent like a virtual influencer in promoting brand equity by drawing virtual reality (VR), influencer marketing, and CSR.

Research Paper • Consumer Responses to CSR during the Pandemic: Investigating the Role of Context/cause Fit and Attribution of Motives in Cause-related Marketing • Student • Huatian Zheng; Anqi Lin; Yixin Guo; Ziyi Pan • The study set out to explore the effect of context/cause fit and attribution of CSR motives on consumers’ responses, and whether cause involvement moderates the process during the COVID-19 pandemic. By using convenience samplings, the present study adopted a 2 × 2 between-subject experiment in which 146 college students were randomly exposed to one of four different CRM ads. The findings implied that exposure to high context/cause fit CRM ads encourages generally positive consumers’ responses. Although attribution of motives did not significantly influence participants’ judgement, the way participants perceive the motives behind CRM ads instead of the pre-existing motive shapes their attitude and purchase intention. Due to the special nature of the pandemic, most participants indicated a high involvement status, resulting in no significant moderating role for cause involvement. Surprisingly, female participants tend to be more sensitive to firm-serving motives and favorable to public-serving CRM ads compared to males.

Extended Abstract • Demystify Computer Generated Influencers: The Role of Perceived Anthropomorphism and Social Presence on Audience’s Attitudes toward CGI’s Sponsored Posts and the Endorsed Brands • Faculty • Regina Ahn, University of Miami; Su Yeon Cho, University of Miami; Sunny Tsai, University of Miami • This study explores how the perceived humanness of computer-generated imagery (CGI) influencers is associated with consumers’ attitudes toward the brand-sponsored posts and the endorsed brand. Our online survey with Gen Z consumers showed that both perceived anthropomorphism and social presence of CGI influencers positively influence consumer evaluation outcomes via the mediators of perceived physical and social attractiveness of the CGI.

Extended Abstract • Chinese Consumer Resistance and Coping Strategies to Live Stream Shopping • Faculty • Xiaofeng Jia, University of Miami; Regina Ahn, University of Miami • Given the explosive growth of live streaming shopping in China, it is critical to explore young consumers’ persuasion knowledge and their coping strategies towards live streaming shopping. Our study aims to understand Chinese consumers’ resistance regarding live streaming experience on e-commerce platforms. Twenty participants were recruited in a local Chinese university to conduct semi-structured in-depth interviews. The study captures several factors that evoke Chinese consumers’ annoyance and counterargument against live streaming tactics, platforms, and sellers.

Research Paper • Why Do We Click on Clickbait? Read on to Find Out Why Persuasion Knowledge Matters • Student • Emily Buteau, University of North Dakota; Joonghwa Lee, University of North Dakota; Soojung Kim • This study tested the moderating role in the effects of clickbait ad type and metadiscourse characteristics on attitudes and intentions toward clickbait advertising. The findings from a two-part experiment indicated that persuasion knowledge moderated the relationship between the effects of clickbait ad type and metadiscourse characteristic on intention to share the ad. Participants with high persuasion knowledge generated higher intentions when shown evidential metadiscourse and more negative intentions when shown exaggeration clickbait. Implications are discussed.

Research Paper • The role of product fit and brand fit on brand co-appearances in television programs • Faculty • Fanny Fong Yee Chan, The Hang Seng University of Hong Kong • Brand clutter has gradually extended from traditional advertising to less conventional marketing communication tools. Although brand co-appearance in media content is likely to continue to proliferate, little is known about the phenomenon and its effects. Building on research related to co-branding and comparative advertising, this study systematically examined the moderating role of brand fit and product fit on the effectiveness of brand co-appearance on television programs. Several pre-tests and four experimental studies were conducted. It was found that product fit and brand fit significantly moderated attitudes and purchase intention toward the coappearing products. The empirical results have significant theoretical and practical implications for the field, which are discussed together with the research avenues.

Extended Abstract • Brand activism and political consumerism: Understanding determinants of consumers’ buycotting and boycotting behaviors in the context of brand activism • Faculty • Moonhee Cho; Minjeong Kim, university of tennessee • The study examined the factors influencing consumers’ boycotting and buycotting intentions in response to brand activism. Conducting an online experimental study among 367 consumers, this study found that the consumer-brand stance congruence significantly influenced consumers’ attitude toward the brand, boycotting, and buycotting intentions. The study also revealed moderating effects of issue involvement and brand trust while these moderating effects vary by the product involvement categories. The mediating role of consumer-brand identification was also found.

Research Paper • Understanding Ad-block Wall and Its Effects on Online Publisher and Advertising through Psychological Reactance • Student • Un Chae Chung, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign; Chang-Dae Ham; Seo Yoon Lee; WooJin Kim, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign; Sang-Hwa Oh, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign • As nearly one third of online users installed ad-blockers, websites relying heavily on the advertising revenue try to overcome this threat by installing ad-block wall on their website, which hinders users from accessing website’s contents. To understand the psychological process of website users when facing this wall, the paper adopted psychological reactance theory and found that different level of ad-block wall can generate different level of reactance outcomes and attitudes.

Research Paper • Advertising in the times of COVID: A Tight-Loose Analysis of Pandemic-Related TV Commercials • Faculty • Cynthia Morton, Department of Advertising, University of Florida.; Naa Amponsah Dodoo, Emerson College; Jorge Villegas, Department of Management, Marketing, and Operations, College of Business and Management, University of Illinois at Springfield; Sophia Mueller, University of Florida; Hye Soo Chang, Department of Advertising, College of Journalism & Communications, University of Florida. • This research explores normative beliefs advocated in the earliest stage of COVID-19 awareness campaigns. The exploration utilizes Tight-Loose Theory and the Hofstede’s dimensions as frameworks to analyze advertisements run from March to June 2020. A content analysis (n=377) found that ad appeals and themes did not strictly follow the predicted expectations of the U.S.’s dominate cultural orientation. This research establishes a benchmark for comparison with the evolutionary stages of COVID-19 advertising.

Research Paper • A Literature Review of Influencer Marketing and Research Agenda: From a Social Network Analysis Perspective • Faculty • Yang Feng, San Diego State University; Quan Xie, Southern Methodist University • The amount of literature on influencer marketing has increased dramatically in recent years. Although extant literature provides valuable insights into the mechanisms of influencer marketing, several research gaps remain, such as inconclusive findings and a lack of a holistic understanding of the endorsement process of influencer marketing. To address the research gaps, we performed a social network analysis (SNA) of findings from 46 journal articles that included 54 distinct studies using Gephi, a network visualization tool. The SNA results revealed seven topic communities and six most important bridging variables (i.e., influencer trustworthiness, parasocial interaction, influencer credibility, brand trust, influencer attachment, and message credibility) in the literature. On the basis of the SNA results and the meaning transfer model, we proposed an integrative theoretical framework to illustrate the independent, mediating, and outcome variables of the endorsement process of influencer marketing. A future research agenda on influencer marketing was also proposed and discussed.

Research Paper • Kidfluencing: The Role of Selling Intent, Logo Presence, and Disclosure Modality on Parental Appraisals • Faculty • Jason Freeman, Brigham Young University; Frank Dardis, Penn State University • Kidfluencers are emerging as valuable brand partners, capable of facilitating engaging peer-to-peer interactions with other child viewers. The current experimental study focuses on the role of disclosure modality, selling intent, and logo presence on parental reactions to kidfluencer content. Findings suggest that the negative consequences of advertising recognition can be ameliorated through sponsorship transparency. However, for some parents, advertising recognition led to greater perceptions of negativity, resulting in unfavorable outcomes. These results suggest that advertising recognition can have diverging consequences, depending the evaluation of the message. Advertising recognition acted as the primary predictor of outcomes related to perceptions of appropriateness of the sponsored content, attitudes toward the brand, purchase intention, and desire to regulate. Practical and theoretical implications are discussed.

Extended Abstract • Native Ads in the Neighborhood: Sponsored Posts Versus User-Generated Content on Nextdoor • Faculty • Benjamin Johnson, University of Florida; Susanna Lee, University of Florida • This study examines how older adults on the neighborhood-oriented app Nextdoor respond to native advertisements. A within-subjects experiment compared social posts, native ads, and traditional ads. Outcomes included credibility, fear emotion, persuasion knowledge, ad attitude, brand attitude, and purchase intentions. Differences were found in favor of social posts (i.e., posts from neighbors). Native ads were evaluated as more similar to traditional ads than social posts. Finally, the study examines potential mediation and moderation.

Research Paper • Seeing a New Self in Dadvertisements: Responses to Ads and Fatherhood Anxiety • Faculty • Benjamin Johnson, University of Florida; Bhakti Sharma, University of Florida; Sophia Mueller, University of Florida; Cynthia Morton, Department of Advertising, University of Florida.; Jon Morris • Advertising portrayals of fathers have the potential to influence new fathers’ self-perceptions. A 2×2 experiment of 269 men, aged 25-40, compared new fathers’ with non- or established fathers’ emotional response, anxiety, and boundary expansion to dad-targeted advertisements. Emotions and perceptions of the “dad in the ad” were proposed to mediate effects on the persuasiveness of the advertisement. The research found that new fathers felt more anxiety, which produced greater boundary expansion and wishful identification.

Research Paper • Contoured and In Control: African-American Women, Beauty Brand Representation, and Consumer Satisfaction • Faculty • Raegan Burden, University of Florida; Benjamin Johnson, University of Florida; Sophie Jean-Michel, University of Florida; Challet Jeong, University of Florida; Hà Nguyễn; Bijun Wu • Beauty brands such as makeup lines continue to struggle with representing the full diversity of women in their products and advertising. This study is a survey of African-American women aged 25-49, in which they provided their perceptions of 10 popular makeup brands. Self-determination theory was used to demonstrate how seeing one’s self represented in products and advertising increases feelings of autonomy, competence, and relatedness, and how this translates positively into consumer attitudes and behavior.

Research Paper • The Role of Perceived Interactivity and User Gratifications to Use Live-Streaming Commerce • Faculty • Eunsin Joo; Jing Yang • Live-streaming commerce has recently emerged as a popular selling channel that encourages consumer interaction and participation while shopping online. The purpose of this study was to investigate how consumers’ perceived interactivity influences the use and purchase intents of live streaming commerce, while exploring the mediating roles of cognitive and affective motivation in the relationships. A scenario-based survey study of 187 American consumers was conducted via Prolific.co. The results showed that perceived interactivity in the live-streaming commerce significantly influenced consumers’ usage intention of live-streaming commerce and purchase intention of the recommended products through live-streaming commerce. Specifically, results showed that perceived utility and enjoyment were significant mediators in between the perceived interactivity and consumers’ usage intention of live-streaming commerce. And perceived enjoyment also plays a significant mediating role in between the perceived interactivity and consumers’ purchase intention. Theoretical and managerial implications, limitations and future studies are also discussed.

Research Paper • Investigating the Marketing Effectiveness of Virtual Influencers • Student • Siu Ting Josie Kiew; ZhaoXi Phua; Jia En Celine Ong; Tze Yen Michelle Lee; Chen Lou • Guided by the Uses and Gratification approach along with the Uncanny Valley Theory, this study sought to understand the phenomenon of virtual influencers. Based on an in-depth interview with 26 participants who are following virtual influencers, this study identified user motivations – including information motivation, entertainment motivation, surveillance, aesthetics, and social identification – for following. We also found that followers perceive virtual influencers as uncanny and eerie. However, followers expressed acceptance towards virtual influencers where authenticity, human-likeness, and self-justification were found to mitigate the effects of the uncanny valley. Finally, in terms of its role in advertising effectiveness, we found that virtual influencers are effective for building brand image and brand awareness but lack persuasive ability to incite purchase intentions. The findings advanced extant literature on user motivations for following virtual influencers in the new edge of social media influencers, provided insights on mitigating factors of the uncanny valley, as well as delineated the efficacy of virtual influencers in advertising campaigns.

Research Paper • Rhetorical Devices in Agency Philosophies: An Analysis of Rhetorical Figures in Slogans of Top Ranking Agencies for Creativity and Effectiveness • Student • Heidi Makady, University of Florida; Kasey Windels, University of Florida • Rhetorical figures in slogans are one way agencies emphasize their philosophies. This study explores the use of textual rhetorical figures in agency philosophies of top ranking WARC agencies. In line with the advertising taxonomy framework, content analysis indicated that irregular models (tropes) were most frequently used. Slogan length and semantic complexity were also positively correlated with WARC creativity scores. The sampling frame for this study is the WARC 2019 – 2020 effectiveness and creativity global rankings.

Research Paper • Adding or Averaging? How Weak Arguments Influence the Persuasive Effects of Strong Arguments • Faculty • Magdalena Obermaier; Thomas Koch • Mostly relying on a “the-more-the-better” heuristic, persuasive communication research has rarely scrutinized the effects of the mutual presentation of weak and strong arguments. Building on research on judgment formation, we conducted four experimental studies on political and health-related topics and demonstrated that providing supporting arguments of moderate strength along with a strong argument increases persuasion (adding). However, presenting weak supporting arguments along with a strong argument reduces the persuasive effect of the strong argument (averaging).

Research Paper • Exploring the Influence of Advertising Spokesperson’s Racial Identity and Product Type Endorsed on Consumer Decision-Making • Student • LOUVINS PIERRE, University of Connecticut; Carolyn Lin • Limited research has examined how racially diverse models in advertising influence consumers’ decision-making process. This research tested how spokespersons’ racial identity and the product type they endorsed influenced evaluation of spokesperson attributes and consumer behavior. Results showed that spokespersons’ race had a significant effect on all variables, but product type only affected purchase intention. A path model also tested how the interrelations between spokesperson attributes, product involvement and information-seeking contributed to explain purchase intention.

Research Paper • Native Twitter Ads: Testing the role of Media Format and Disclosure • Student • LOUVINS PIERRE, University of Connecticut; Anne Oeldorf-Hirsch, University of Connecticut; Yukyung Lee, University of Connecticut • Native advertising is now a common strategy that marketers utilize to advertise effectively. This study used an experimental 3 (text only, text plus image, or video) X 2 (disclosure: present/absent between-subjects design (N = 322) to test how media format and disclosure influence attitudes and behavioral intentions. Results show that only media format has a main effect, such that richer media (videos) help to reduce persuasion knowledge. Moreover, skepticism, intrusiveness, and persuasion knowledge negatively predict attitudes, while manipulativeness predicts both attitudes and share intention. This study is one of the first to examine media format and disclosure, and by implication conclude rich media with disclosure help advertising effectiveness.

Research Paper • Seeker or Sentry? Consumers’ Coping Mechanism with Third-Party Cookie Driven Advertising: Multidimensional Persuasion Knowledge Perspective • Student • Un Chae Chung, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign; Ayoung Seok; Chang-Dae Ham • Majority of digital advertising is delivered by third-party cookie-based targeting technology, but little is known how consumers cope with this unique persuasion technology. To fill the gap, this study integrated multidimensional persuasion knowledge, tactic evaluation, and target response strategy into a model. Employing an online survey (N=204), this study found that conceptual persuasion knowledge was both directly and indirectly associated with sentry or seeker strategy via evaluative persuasion knowledge and tactic evaluations. Implications are discussed.

Research Paper • To Tell or Not to Tell: Effects of AI-powered Virtual Try-on Feature and Transparency on Brand Attitudes and Purchase Intentions • Student • Yuan Sun; Jason Freeman, Brigham Young University; Heather Shoenberger; Fuyuan Shen • Through an online experiment (N = 204) where users virtually tried on products recommended from an augmented reality (AR) site, we found that AR experience positively affected product and brand attitudes through vividness and immersion while it also triggered perceived intrusiveness. Being transparent about data collection increased the privacy protection perception and mitigated perceived intrusiveness. Transparency perception functioned as a crucial antecedent of trust, which was moderated by users’ initial belief in artificial intelligence.

Extended Abstract • Extended Abstract: Examining Employee Reception of Corporate Social Advocacy Communicated by Leadership: Effects on Employee-Organization Relationships and Work Engagement • Student • Teresa Tackett; Lucinda Austin, University of North Carolina • The advertising industry engaged in corporate social advocacy (CSA) in response to #CommitToChange, which demanded meaningful action from advertising industry leaders regarding lack of BIPOC representation. Organizations have an obligation to understand how CSA efforts impact internal publics, as well as traditionally studied external perceptions. An online survey examines a sample of employees who work at creative agencies, and attitudes toward their agency’s (lack of) participation, communication and leadership authenticity, employee-organization relationships and work engagement.

Research Paper • Pride and Prejudice and Country-of-Origin Ecological Images • Faculty • Min Xiao; Paul Myers • Consumer demand for eco-friendly products is increasing. To respond to the increasing demand, brands and marketers are offering more products that they claim to be green or eco-friendly. Nowadays, many consumers purchase eco-friendly products online. However, it is very difficult for consumers to verify the validity or credibility of green claims of a product listed on online stores because marketers may not provide any evidence to support their green claims and consumers may lack the ability to authenticate the validity of the claims by themselves. Hence, consumers may have no better choice but to rely on information cues, such as the country-of-origin (COO) or the price of a product, to help them evaluate the credibility of green claims. Two online experiments were conducted to examine how product COO, product price, and product involvement affect consumer perception of product greenness and green claim credibility. The findings suggest that product COO exerts an overwhelming influence on consumer perception.

Extended Abstract • (Extended Abstract) Helping A Friend in Need: A Study of Facebook Fundraisers • Faculty • Fei Xue; Lijie Zhou • Based on Social Impact Theory, the current research examined the effects of different types of Facebook fundraising posts on perceived source credibility, attitude toward the post, intention to click, intention to share, and intention to donate. Three factors of social influence were investigated – relationship strength, immediacy of needs, and number of donations. Main effects were found for immediacy of needs and number of donations. Interaction effects were found in perceived credibility and intention to click.

Research Paper • “Do Good and Be ‘Liked’”: Corporate Messaging on Social Media During COVID-19 and Consumer Responses • Faculty • Jing Yang; Ebbe Bertellotti; Ava Francesca Battocchio, Michigan State University; Camila Teran • This study explores the types of corporate messaging on social media during the outbreak of COVID-19 in the U.S., and its corresponding differences in consumer engagement, attitude, and brand trust. Two independent studies were conducted. In Study 1, we content analyzed corporations’ social media posts and found four types of corporate messaging, namely, internal corporate social responsibility (CSR), external CSR, promotional CSR, and company statement. Among all, internal CSR received the highest consumers’ behavioral engagement as compared to the others. In Study 2, we adopted an online-experimental design to further valid and extend the findings of Study 1. Results showed significant differences among the types of corporate messaging in driving consumers’ behavioral engagement intention, brand attitude and brand trust. Robustly, promotional CSR was the least effective corporate messaging across all. Theoretical contributions, managerial implications and future study directions are also discussed towards the end.

Research Paper • Using Funny Memes in Social Media Advertising: The Moderating Role of Bandwagon Cues • Faculty • Guolan Yang • The study conducted a 2 (image type: funny meme vs. serious image) x 2 (level of bandwagon cue: high vs. low) between-subjects online experiment (N = 258). Results showed that using memes was more effective than using serious images in the setting of brand-related Twitter posts. Consumers perceived the meme post as humorous, which in turn resulted in positive attitudes toward the post and greater intention to share the post on social media. Furthermore, bandwagon cues moderated the meme effect on persuasion through perceived humor. Consumers’ humor perception was enhanced when they were exposed to a meme post with a large number of likes, comments, and retweets. This study used funny memes as humor stimuli, extending the humor literature to social media advertising. Plus, it illustrated the importance of bandwagon effects for humor persuasion.

Research Paper • Realistic skin vs. Flawless skin: An investigation of the appeal of retouch-free advertising • Student • Tingting Yang, Nanyang Technological University, WKWSCI; Chen Lou; Edson Tandoc Jr • “Using retouched models in advertisements to embody idealised beauty prototypes in certain cultures (e.g., flawless skin) has been a widely known yet controversial practice. Considering the emerging trend of “”bare skin look”” in advertising, female consumers’ beliefs about ideal beauty (i.e., skin ideal in this study) and the use of retouching may be changing. Guided by the corporate moral responsibility framework, this study conducted an online experiment to assess ad retouching and disclaimers’ effect on advertising effectiveness. A 2 (model skin: realistic skin vs. flawless skin) x 2 (retouch-free disclaimer: present vs. absent) between-subjects online experiment was conducted among Chinese female participants. Results revealed that although preference of flawless skin still drives Chinese female consumers’ purchase intentions, an ad portraying realistic skin model with a retouch-free disclaimer was more sought after for Chinese female consumers, and Ad honesty mediated the interaction effect of model skin and disclaimer on consumers’ purchase intentions. This study’s findings provide theoretical and practical insights into how brands can better appeal to contemporary female Asian consumers.

Keywords: corporate moral responsibility, disclaimer, retouching, ideal beauty, consumer behaviour”

Research Paper • Outdoor-sports Brand Communities on Instagram: How Message Attributes Relate to Consumer Engagement • Student • Jennifer Shiyue Zhang; Leona Yi-Fan Su • Brands are increasingly using social media to build online communities as part of their marketing efforts. The present study analyzes the Instagram strategies used by three global outdoor sports brands and their respective effects on consumer engagement, operationalized as the number of likes and comments received by posts. Content analysis of 957 Instagram posts from Arc’teryx, Salomon, and Patagonia, focused on messages’ textual, visual, and technical attributes, was conducted. Multiple regression indicated that task- and interaction-oriented posts received more likes than self-oriented ones. Messages that were shorter, posted photos rather than videos, presented “cute” visuals, and mentioned other users were also more likely to motivate consumer engagement. These findings’ implications for marketers seeking to develop Instagram strategies that will effectively boost consumer interaction are discussed.

Research Paper • Blending Sex-Positivity and Racial Justice Advocacy in Black-Centric Health Advertising: Intersectional Health Communication Targeting High-Risk Black Cisgender Heterosexual and Black LGBTQ Populations Through a HIV Prevention Social Media Campaign • Faculty • Minjie Li, The University of Tampa • Health disparity disproportionately impact people of colors, Black LGBTQ members in particular. In order to effectively persuade members from these communities on issues that impact them—such as HIV prevention, health advertising has started to apply the sex-positive approach in their crafting of visual and messaging. Through integrating intersectionality, social identity theory, and distinctiveness theory, the present study examines how different types of sex-positive depictions (i.e., heterosexual, queer) in a Black-centric health advertising campaign interact with audience’s identity to influence the Black cisgender heterosexual Americans and Black LGBTQ-identified Americans’ adaption of the PrEP regimen, advertising perception, and Black identification. Moreover, the study examines how such joint effects might be moderated by the ways in which the campaign incorporate social activism (i.e., intersectional, non-intersectional, no activism). The findings demonstrate that sex-positive depiction indeed interact with audience identity to significantly increase perceived susceptibility to contracting HIV, perceive response efficacy, intention to adopt the PrEP regimen when offered for free, and positive attitudes towards the PrEP ad campaign.

Research Paper • A woman’s view from a man’s world: The reality of being female in advertising • Student • Sophia Mueller, University of Florida; Eliana DuBosar, University of Florida; Kasey Windels, University of Florida • Few studies to date have sought to understand females’ experiences in all departments of an advertising industry. This paper seeks to explore the challenges women have faced in this industry through an analysis of in-depth interviews conducted with 24 practitioners in different agency roles. Interviewees discussed how gender impacted their careers, and their statements were analyzed, revealing five key themes. Implications for advertising practitioners and directions for future research are also addressed.

Research Paper • Pressing Issues of Ethnic Diversity in the Ad Industry: The Professionals’ Perspectives • Faculty • Fang Yang, Grand Valley State University; Robin Spring, Grand Valley State University • “The advertising industry has suffered from lack of ethnic diversity for decades and little progress has been made toward meaningful changes. To probe the reasons for advertising’s diversity lag, in-depth interviews with 17 advertising professionals and a national survey with ad agencies from all 50 states were conducted to gather sentiment and understanding. Research questions ranged from the potential benefits of diversity to the pipeline issue of ethnically diverse talent and the reasons for the persistent imbalance. Emerging insights from this mixed-method study suggest that unconscious bias fueled by political ideology, gender, and size of agency factor into the equation. Suggestions are made to advance ethnic diversity in the advertising workforce with the hope of realizing the many benefits a representative workforce can bring.

Keywords: advertising, ad agency, ethnic diversity, unconscious bias, political ideology”

Extended Abstract • Sell, Ignore, or Address? Examining Consumers’ Emotional Responses to Different Types of Social Media Influencers’ Posts During the COVID-19 Outbreak • Student • Maral Abdollahi; Wonsun Shin; Smitha Muthya Sudheendra, University of Minnesota; Jisu Huh; Jaideep Srivastava • This study examines consumers’ emotional reactions to different types of social media posts from three types of social media influencers during the COVID-19 outbreak. A computational research method was employed to analyze nine discrete emotions. While followers felt more “relief” toward COVID-related posts from micro-influencers, they also felt more “hate” toward their marketing posts. On the other hand, followers found it more acceptable if mega- and macro-influencers tried to sell something during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Research Paper • Social Media Advertising and Big Data at the Intersection: A Diversity Perspective to Interdisciplinary Communication • Faculty • Ye Wang; Huan Chen, University of Florida; Srichakradhar Reddy Nagireddy, BelowFive; Yugyung Lee • The purpose of this paper is to examine the current status of Big Data research on social media advertising, and investigate obstacles and strategies for effective communication across disciplines. The Big Data approach involves two disciplines: advertising and computer science. Thus, the focus of the studies is collaborative research of these two disciplines. Grounded in the theories of interdisciplinarity, weak and strong communication, interactional expertise, two studies were conducted. Study 1 used LDA+BERT topic modeling, pyLDA and wordcloud visualization, and analyzed 199 abstracts of Big Data advertising research papers from 2016 to 2020. Findings showed a clear trend of incorporating machine learning in interdisciplinary advertising research on social media. Study 2 adopted the perspective of the intercultural workgroup communication theory. By interviewing 20 researchers from each discipline, Study 2 found that there is a lack of adequate listening between the two disciplines. The current remedies rely heavily on a sense of openness at intrapersonal and interpersonal levels, and individual go-betweeners with non-authoritative leadership style and interactional expertise. More scalable solutions have to address the issues of evaluating interdisciplinary research in tenure and promotion systems, and institutionalized platforms for disciplines to mingle with each other.

Extended Abstract • Extended Abstract: What Ad Age’s A-List Agencies Learned from COVID-19: A Phenomenological Approach • Faculty • Frauke Hachtmann, University of Nebraska-Lincoln • This phenomenology explores how some of the most successful advertising agencies’ senior executives experienced the global health pandemic in 2020 and what they learned from serving clients when consumers were forced into lockdown, brands slashed their media budgets, and social unrest unfolded simultaneously. The study is based on in-depth interview data from 13 individuals who worked in 10 different agencies of varying sizes across the United States and reveals five qualitative meta-themes.

Research Paper • Effects of narrative-based corporate message and sponsorship disclosure in native CSR advertising • Faculty • Jiangxue Han; Shanshan Lou, Appalachian State University; Fuyuan Shen; Heidi Hatfield Edwards, Florida Institute of Technology • There has been a rise in the use of native advertising as a tactic to inform stakeholders of a company’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities. In addition, communicating CSR through storytelling has shown to be effective in generating positive brand attitudes through transportation, identification, and engagement. The present study explores the effects of message format (narrative vs. non-narrative) and disclosure prominence (subtle vs. prominent) when communicating a brand’s CSR initiatives on message effectiveness. The findings showed that a narrative CSR advertising message led to greater identification, transportation, and engagement than a non-narrative CSR advertising message. A message with subtle disclosure led to less ad recognition and more positive message evaluations than a message with prominent disclosure. Ad recognition had a negative impact on message attitude, brand attitude, and purchase intention.

Research Paper • Advertising’s Youthful Obsession: How a Valorization of Youthfulness Has Defined the Advertising Industry and Impacted Its Workforce • Faculty • Kasey Windels, University of Florida; Eliana DuBosar, University of Florida; Sophia Mueller, University of Florida • Advertisers serve as cultural intermediaries, using cultural references to create symbolic meaning for goods. Youthfulness is one highly desirable quality brands mobilize to create a sense of cutting-edge style. Based on in-depth interviews with 22 advertising practitioners, this study examines what youthfulness has come to represent in advertising and how that affects the experiences of workers in the industry. Findings suggest discourses of passion and hunger for younger workers and discourses of datedness and disillusionment for older workers are common. The valorization of youthfulness, along with its related discourses, prompt younger and older workers each to engage in particular forms of immaterial labor, or activities that contribute value, but are outside of the constraints of paid employment. While younger workers must spend considerable time engaging in the immaterial labor of following youthful social media and cultural trends, older workers must engage in immaterial labor to embody youthfulness.

Research Paper • Effectiveness of Corporate Social Responsibility Activities in the COVID-19 Pandemic • Faculty • Jueman (Mandy) Zhang, New York Institute of Technology; Yi (Jasmine) Wang, University of Louisville • This study compared two types of corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities tailored to the COVID-19 pandemic—donation of tailored products and innovative manufacturing of needed supplies with two types of regular CSR activities—donation of regular products and release of CSR commercials regarding two nondurable products companies. The findings revealed that tailored CSR activities resulted in greater differentiation and innovativeness. The two types of tailored CSR activities, together with regular donation were superior to CSR commercials in terms of company function-CSR activity fit, CSR activity dynamic and company image. The impact of CSR activity type on CSR activity dynamic and company sincerity vary depending on the company and its detailed activities. Similar interaction patterns suggest the possible association between dynamic of CSR activities and company sincerity. All types of CSR activities increased the company CSR evaluations, with tailored donation revealing the salient advantage over others. None of the CSR activities improved brand equity.

Extended Abstract • Extended Abstract: Pinterest Discussions to Support Student Learning in Online Advertising and Media Courses • Faculty • Heidi Huntington, West Texas A&M University • Visual bookmarking app Pinterest, known for its aspirational and consumptive qualities of user’s “pinning” work, has recently made concerted forays into the online advertising and marketing space. At the same time, its visual and collaborative qualities offer unique potential for application in pedagogy. This extended abstract describes a pedagogical assessment study examining a Pinterest-based discussion board series, specifically Pinterest’s role in fostering collaboration and learning in an online digital advertising course.

2022 Abstracts

Public Relations Division

2021 Abstracts

Research Paper • Faculty • Award submission: Doug Newsome • Donnalyn Pompper, university of oregon; Eric Kwame Adae, Drake University • Public Relations and Sustainability across the African Continent: Using Afro-Centric Philosophies to Remember What’s Been ‘Forgotten or Lost’ • Assuring sustainability across the African continent – the cradle of humankind – is an ethical public relations responsibility. There is insufficient research about public relations as a tool for supporting sustainability goals across the world’s second-largest and second-most populous continent (Volk, 2017); one that the rest of the planet relies upon for forests serving as “lungs of the world” (Fleshman, 2008). To begin filling the gap, we address challenges of making sustainability happen here, given a long history of negative colonial and neocolonial forces operating in many of Africa’s nations. Despite these impediments, enduring are indigenous, pre-colonial Afro-centric philosophies of communalism/collectivism and harmony with the natural environment that support sustainability efforts. We interrogate six indigenous philosophies which resonate with values that make contemporary public relations ethical. We discuss why professional public relations shaped by Afro-centric philosophies is welcomed, globally, and is critical for addressing sustainability across the continent.

Research Paper • Student • Award submission: Doug Newsome • Erika Schneider, University of Missori • From Saving Face to Saving Lives: Prioritizing the Public in Public Relations • Traditional crisis communication literature emphasizes how organizations use communication to protect reputation by shifting attributions of crisis responsibility. The purpose of this study is to reevaluate this approach by comparing proposed framework strategies that serve to protect stakeholders with reputational messaging. Findings from this between-subjects experimental design study provide insight on how informed organizational decision-making, such as corrective action and organizational learning, can reduce feelings of anger while prioritizing stakeholder wellbeing in public relations.

Research Paper • Student • Award submission: Race & Public Relations • Drew T. Ashby-King, University of Maryland • Racism and Social Issues Management: Examining State Universities’ Responses to the Killing of George Floyd • Colleges and universities are social institutions often called on speak about social issues, such as responding to instances of racism on campus. Critics have suggested that when responding instances of racism on their campus, institutional leaders often ignore the racist act and harm caused and focus their discourse on diversity and inclusion. Considering this critique, this study used social issues management as a framework to explore how state flagship universities in the United States (U.S.) responded to an instance of racism that did not occur on their campuses. A qualitative analysis of all 50 U.S. state flagship universities’ initial public statement in response to the police killing of George Floyd led to three key findings: (1) institutions were made to speak on the issue by larger social discourse; (2) through their statements institutions (re)defined the issue as one of diversity and inclusion rather than racism and police brutality; and (3) guided by the logic of whiteness institutions legitimized their definition of the issue. Based on these findings, I argue that the initial conceptualization of social issues management did not adequality consider the power organizations have to define social issues through their discourse. Therefore, I conclude by suggesting an approach to social issues management that centers those most effected by the issue in order to promote social justice.

Research Paper • Student • Award submission: Race & Public Relations • Ryan Comfort, Indiana University • Rethinking cultural factors in government communication: A survey of environmental professionals working for indigenous governments • This study examined the use of and attitudes towards communication media by environmental and natural resource management personnel employed by indigenous nations in the U.S. Survey data on professionals’ use of media, attitudes, and perceived obstacles to better use of media for science & environmental communication revealed that concerns about sharing cultural ecological information may carry significant weight in the communication decision making process of indigenous environmental agencies.

Research Paper • Faculty • Award submission: Race & Public Relations • Tiffany Gallicano, UNC Charlotte; Olivia Lawless; Abagail Higgins; Samira Shaikh; Sara Levens • The Hybrid Firestorm: A Qualitative Study of Black Lives Matter Activism and the COVID-19 Pandemic • The combination of a global pandemic and an ignited social justice movement has created a saturated digital environment in which people turn to social media to navigate a hybrid firestorm fueled by both the Black Lives Matter movement and the COVID-19 pandemic. Although the circuit of culture has been studied in the context of a pandemic (Curtin & Gaither, 2006) and digital activism (Han & Zhang, 2009), research using any theoretical model to study a hybrid firestorm could not be found. This study consists of interviews with 25 participants involving their experiences in the hybrid firestorm. The circuit of culture is used, which is a model composed of five moments, to explore how meaning is created, interpreted, and contested in the context of a social justice movement and a global pandemic.

Research Paper • Faculty • Award submission: Race & Public Relations • Yeunjae Lee, University of Miami; Jo-Yun Li • Discriminated Against but Engaged: The Role of Communicative Behaviors of Racial Minority Employees • Grounded in the situational theory of problem-solving (STOPS), two survey studies investigated how racial minority employees in the U.S. perceive and communicate about the discriminatory situation within their organizations and how it affects their engagement levels. In Study 1 (N = 461), experiences and observance of both formal and informal discriminatory acts at work reduced racial minority employees’ engagement level, while their situational perceptions increased their communicative behaviors toward direct supervisor and peers, respectively. Communicative behaviors with supervisors, not peers, in turn, increased their engagement. Study 2 (N = 454) replicated and extended Study 1 in different contexts, revealing the moderating role of a diverse climate in increasing racial minority employees’ problem and involvement recognition and decreasing their constraint recognition about workplace discrimination situation. Theoretical and practical implications for race in public relations are discussed.

Research Paper • Faculty • Award submission: Race & Public Relations • Yvette Sterbenk, Ithaca College; Jamie Ward, EMU; Regina Luttrell; Summer Shelton, Idaho State University • Silence Has No Place A Framing Analysis of Corporate Sociopolitical Activism Statements • This study used a quantitative framing analysis to examine the company statements delivered by 105 Fortune 500 companies across 21 sectors in June 2020 in response to three social justice issues that took prominence that month in the United States: Black Lives Matter, immigration laws, and LGBTQ rights. The study uncovered which companies and sectors did not make statements, and, among those that did, what messages were most common.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Lindsey Anderson, University of Maryland • Serving Public Interests and Enacting Organizational Values: An Examination of Public Interest Relations through AARP’s Tele-Town Halls • Public interest relations (PIR) is an approach to public relations scholarship and practice that contributes to the social good by integrating the concept of public interest into organizational goals and values. The need for PIR was emphasized during the COVID-19 pandemic as publics looked to organizations for information about a variety of topics (e.g., symptoms, vaccines). AARP created a series of tele-townhalls to communicate with its publics, who are considered to be members of a “vulnerable population” during the pandemic. In order to understand how AARP’s Coronavirus Tele-Town Halls reflected the practices of PIR, I completed a critical thematic analysis of 28 virtual sessions that were hosted in 2020-2021. The analysis, which was guided by the tenets of PIR, found that AARP’s communication (1) highlighted common life course milestones of its publics, (2) emphasized the quality of the information, and (3) provided avenues to engage with the organization and its experts. Based on these findings, I developed theoretical implications that reflect a critical perspective on PIR and suggest future research avenues that seek to build this ethical and socially meaningful approach to public relations.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Song AO, University of Macau; XIAO QIAN, University of Macau • Understanding the implementation of Enterprise Social Media on Employee Communication: An Affordance Perspective • The research adopts the technological affordance approach to examine the role of enterprise social media (ESM) in employee communication in the context of mainland China. The research postulated that organizations can actualize affordances of ESM to achieve certain goals. Using Enterprise WeChat (EWeChat) as the example, the research interviewed 37 participants to explore organizational goals and actions of EWeChat affordance actualization in mainland China. Thirteen EWeChat affordances and means of actualization (i.e., association, control, diversity, feedback, outeraction, perpetual contact, persistence, personalization, portability, privacy, social presence, synchronicity, and visibility) for specific organizational goals were identified. The research explicates ESM affordance actualization as the interaction between ESM and organizations, and also between ESM and employees. The research sheds light on how organizations in mainland China can effectively configure their ESM for certain purposes of its mobile application in employee communication.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Anita Atwell Seate, University of Maryland; Brooke Liu, University of Maryland; Samantha Stanley; Yumin Yan; Allison Chatham, University of Maryland • Relational Tensions and Publics during Disasters: Investigating Organizational Relationships Ethnographically • Relationships are essential for a fully functioning society. Through a multi-sited rapid ethnography, we show how organizations achieve their mission through organizational partners and active publics in the context of disasters. We provide insights into relational tensions that occur in organization-public relationships (OPRs) and how communication can address those relational tensions. In doing so, we answer calls for broadening methodologies to examine OPRs. Overall, we demonstrate the value of continuing to theorize the network approach.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Brandon Boatwright • Exploring Online Opinion Leadership: An Analysis of the Influential Users on Twitter During the Online Conversation Around Anthem Protests by Prominent Athletes • The current study explores the role of online opinion leaders on Twitter in conversations around anthem protests by prominent athletes. The aim of the study is twofold: (1) identify the influential opinion leaders in Twitter conversations related to Colin Kaepernick and Megan Rapinoe, and (2) further understand how and why social media users participate in conversations online about controversial subjects. Ultimately, results from this study extend the network paradigm in public relations research by examining the role of individual users in the construction of a discursive landscape of issue networks. The study combines social network analysis with in-depth interviews in order to adopt a more wholistic framework for studying online opinion leadership in the context of public relations research.

Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • Denise Bortree, Penn State University; Michail Vafeiadis; Pratiti Diddi, Lamar University; Ryan Wang • Extended abstract: Promoting diversity and inclusion: How Fortune 500 companies talk about diversity on Twitter • This study examines more than 11,000 tweets on diversity topics posted by Fortune 500 companies in 2019. It identifies the 18 most common topics in six general areas – workplace diversity/inclusion, gender/women, sexual orientation, race/ethnicity, disability and activism. Corporations with higher CSR ratings tend to post more diversity-related tweets. Analysis suggests that companies tend to use different topics in original posts and retweets/replies/comments on diversity. Engagement rates on diversity topics vary widely.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Luke Capizzo, James Madison University; Meredith Feinman • Extending civic values in architectures of listening: Arendt, Mouffe and the pluralistic imperative for organizational listening • This conceptual paper introduces the concept of civic listening to augment organizational listening theory and practice. Drawing from the writing of Arendt and Mouffe, it centers pluralism, agonism, deliberation, and reflection as central to listening and delineates the functions and values of civic listening to add to existing architectures. This new perspective points toward deeper, more nuanced, and more equitable organizational engagement in civic discourse and firmer ground for contentious issue engagement.

Extended Abstract • Member • Open Competition • Ioana Coman, Texas Tech University; Jiun-Yi Tsai, Northern Arizona University; Shupei Yuan, Northern Illinois University • Extended Abstract: Toward an Audience-Centric Framework of Situational Corporate Social Advocacy Strategy: A pilot study • Increasingly companies engage in Corporate Social Advocacy or Political Activism. Yet how publics expect companies to take a stance (sometimes even action) on controversial issues remains unclear. We propose an audience-centric approach to investigate how audiences expect companies to act on hot button issues and their reasoning process, through a mixed-method analysis of a survey (N=388) conducted at a public University. Results highlight a need to further understand CSA from audience perceptions.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Yuan Wang, City University of Hong Kong; Yi-Hui Christine Huang, City University of Hong Kong; Qinxian Cai, City University of Hong Kong • Exploring the Mediating Effect of Government–Public Relationships during the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Model Comparison Approach • This study proposed, tested, and compared two models to examine the antecedent and outcome of government–public relationships during the COVID-19 pandemic. It conducted three surveys of 9,675 publics in Mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. It found that publics’ perceived governmental responsiveness leads to their satisfaction with and trust in the government, which influence their word-of-mouth intention about the vaccines. Furthermore, relational satisfaction and trust mediate the relationship between perceived responsiveness and word-of-mouth intention.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Taisik Hwang, Suffolk University • A Comparison of Twitter Use by Different Sector Organizations • “Given the shifting nature of communication environment, this study attempts to discover how leading nature education organizations utilize social media to effectively reach and build relationship with their audiences. Specifically, it employed a content analysis to examine how the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), U.S. National Park Service (NPS), and National Geographic (NG) take advantage of Twitter to better communicate with their external publics. Out of a total of 6,286 tweets sent by these organizations for a six-month period from January to June 2018, a random sample was used for quantitative analysis. Findings show that there are significant differences in these organizations’ use of message functions as well as mentioning of brand names associated with them. For example, both UNESCO and NPS tend to focus on building community with their external stakeholders, whereas NG’s tweets mainly involves the information function. The current study

will benefit other non-profit organizations by revealing ways in which these organizations purposefully use social media to fulfill their mission and suggesting practical guidelines to strategic communicators in public-sector organizations.”

Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • Grace Ji, Boston University; Cheng Hong, California State University Sacramento • Feeling elevated: Examine the mediation role of elevation in CEO activism on employee prosocial engagement • With a survey of 600 U.S. employees, this study investigated the effect of authentic leadership on employees’ prosocial advocacy engagement in the context of CEO activism. Employees’ moral elevation and organizational identification were examined as mediators. Results showed authentic leadership elicited employees’ positive emotion of elevation and enhanced their identification with the company. In turn, employees’ affective (elevation) and cognitive (organizational identification) responses mediated authentic leadership’s impact on motivating employees’ activism participation.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Eunyoung Kim, Auburn University at Montgomery; Sung Eun Park, Webster University • Influence of identification, relationship, and involvement of a donor on attitudes towards and behavioral intentions to online donation via SNS • This study seeks what factors predict publics’ behavioral intentions to online donate and share words via social media. Relevant literature was reviewed, and an online survey was conducted to examine hypotheses. The results show that identification, involvement, perceived credibility, and attitudes towards online donation predict intention to donate via social media, while attitudes towards helping others, identification, involvement, and site features affect the intention of Word-of-Mouth. Theoretical and practical implications are presented in the discussion and conclusion.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Sora Kim, The Chinese University of Hong Kong • Public Expectations of Government Pandemic-Crisis Communication What and How to Communicate during the COVID-19 Pandemic • Through two representative online surveys in Hong Kong (HK) and the U.S. (US) during the COVID-19 pandemic, this study investigates, from a public-centric perspective, public expectations of effective government pandemic-crisis communication. It looks specifically at what publics want to be communicated in times of a global pandemic and how. In each region, the findings identify four significant dimensions. Three are culturally universal dimensions—basic responsibility, locus of pandemic-crisis responsibility, and disfavor of promotional tone. The fourth is culture-specific—personal relevance for HK and frequency for the US. Among the significant dimensions, the most highly expected is what people consider government’s basic responsibility in pandemic communication, that is, a basic responsibility dimension. This includes providing instructing and adjusting information and securing accuracy, timeliness, and transparency in pandemic communication. In both regions, respondents preferred by far traditional media and non-governmental sources to social media and governmental sources.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Sining Kong, Texas A & M University at Corpus Christi; Huan Chen, University of Florida • Revisiting SMCC Model: How Chinese Public Relations Practitioners Handle Social Mediated Crisis • As social media is widely used by Chinese organizations, this study comprehensively examines how Chinese public relations practitioners cope with social mediated crisis and how culture interacts with social mediated crisis response. An in-depth interview was used to collect data from twenty-three Chinese public relations practitioners, who had experience in dealing with crises and issues via social media. Results showed that Chinese public relations practitioners use diverse social media platforms to satisfy the publics’ gratifications and social media usage preferences. Besides, results also showed the importance of matching information form and information source in responding social mediated crisis. Furthermore, it revealed how the uniqueness of Chinese culture moderated Chinese public relations social mediated crisis response, such as maintaining harmony and avoiding direct confrontation, collaborating with opinion leaders and influencers to shape publics’ opinions, using no response, apologizing, and self-mockery, and emphasizing the importance of media relations.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Sushma Kumble, Towson University; Pratiti Diddi, Lamar University; Maggie Whitescarver • Social Listening using Machine Learning to Understand Sense Making and Content Dissemination on Twitter: A Case Study of WHO’s Social Listening Strategy During COVID-19 Initial Phase • The study utilized unsupervised machine learning techniques to the CERC framework on 6.1 Million Tweets between January to March 2020 to understand the sensemaking process during COVID-19 among Twitter users. The study also used content analysis to examine WHO’s response to the popular emerging conversations. Results indicate that while WHO’s messaging addressed the dominant topics during the timeframe but did not effectively address misinformation. The paper discusses the implications and recommendations for health communication practitioners.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Sun Young Lee, University of Maryland–College Park; Duli Shi, University of Maryland; John Leach; Saymin Lee; Cody Buntain, New Jersey Institute of Technology • Global Companies’ Use of Social Media for CSR Communication During COVID-19 • The purpose of the study was to examine how companies have communicated their efforts to address COVID-19 on Facebook and Twitter and to evaluate the effectiveness of their message strategies. We conducted a content analysis of 992 Facebook posts and 1,957 tweets between March 11 and May 20, 2020, from the 2020 RepTrak’s 100 most reputable companies. About one-third of the messages (n = 1,059) were related to companies’ responses to COVID-19. Companies mostly highlighted CSR efforts related to their expertise, partnership efforts, or financial resources. The majority of messages did not specify a particular group’s interests, but when they did, the most impacted groups, such as frontline personnel and employees, were addressed. Companies mostly used social media to employ one-way message strategies, but incorporating multimedia and expressing appreciation to others were found to be effective message strategies for engaging publics emotionally. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Hyunmin Lee, Drexel University; Emma Whitehouse, Drexel University • What do you mean by doing the right thing?: Examining corporate social advocacy frames and transparency efforts in Fortune 500 companies’ website • This study examined the state of corporate social advocacy (CSA) initiatives among Fortune 500 companies via a content analysis of their official websites. There is a need to critically examine the ways in which CSA is communicated to create a normative understanding as to what constitutes of ethical and transparent CSA communication. Findings showed that episodic frames were popularly utilized to communicate about CSA and transparency efforts varied according to CSA type and location.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Juan Liu, Columbus State University; Bruce Getz, Columbus State University • How Nike and Gillette Survived the Tension between Corporate Social Advocacy and Boycotting Backlash • Both 2018 Nike’s Colin Kaepernick and 2019 Gillette commercial campaigns received backlash on social media over their messages addressing controversial social-political issues. Drawing on legitimacy theory, this study examines how polarized boycotting and advocating messages on Twitter affect interactive engagement and perceptions of corporate social advocacy. In both Nike and Gillette conditions, individuals who expressed strong value alignment with brands’ campaigns, were more susceptible to be affected by polarized tweets. When evaluating brands’ motivations for corporate social advocacy, results showed that individuals with weak value alignment were more likely to be affected by polarized messages. However, this pattern is only found in the Gillette condition. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • Stephanie Madden, Penn State University; Nicholas Eng, Penn State University; Jessica Myrick, Penn State University • Public Perceptions of Using the Wireless Emergency Alert System for COVID-19: Lessons for State Government Crisis Communication • On November 25, 2020, the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency (PEMA) sent out a COVID-19 public health message via the Wireless Emergency Alert system. Using survey (N = 212) and interview (N = 19) research, this study sought to understand the targeted publics’ reaction to this message and factors impacting potential behavior change after receiving this message. Because COVID-19 response has relied on state governments, this research provides important findings for government communicators at the state level.

Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • Yufan “Sunny” Qin, University of Florida; Alexis Fitzsimmons, University of Florida; Eve Heffron, University of Florida; Marcia DiStaso, University of Florida • Communicating the Big Picture with Employees: The Impacts of CEO Vision Communication on Employee Engagement • Communicating an organizational vision with employees can be critical to help employees internalize the vision, which might in turn increase their willingness to get engaged with the work and subsequently achieving higher goals. The aim of this study is to examine whether and how CEO vision communication could influence employee engagement. This study also proposes employees’ perceptions of work meaningfulness and organizational identification as the potential underlying mechanism that mediate the relationship between CEO vision communication and employee engagement. An online survey was conducted with employees across various industries in the U.S.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Margaret Ritsch, Washington State University; Erin Tomson, Washington State University • Internal Activism at Amazon: Rhetorical Strategies and the Public Relations Response • “This study examined the public relations response to employee activism at Amazon during the Covid-19 pandemic. Public relations has typically been examined from a functional perspective, which largely ignores the power dynamics between an organization and its employees, who are important stakeholders that contribute to the organization’s public image. Critical theory provides a useful lens to examine the dynamics of organizational power and control, although this approach has typically been applied to the study of internal communication dynamics. The study addresses this gap by using a critical rhetorical approach to examine Amazon’s response to employee activism. Researchers conducted qualitative content analysis of news media coverage and Amazon’s company content (e.g. websites and public statements). The data indicates that Amazon spokespeople used aggressive rhetorical strategies in their communication with and about employee activists that discouraged unionization and ultimately attempted to prevent current and former Amazon employees from speaking up about their experiences working for the company.

Keywords: activism, employee, public relations, internal communication”

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Baobao Song; Weiting Tao • Unpack the Relational and Behavioral Outcomes of Internal CSR: Highlighting Dialogic Communication and Managerial Facilitation • The current study examines how corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication and management contributes to internal public relationship building and employees’ megaphoning behaviors. Specifically, it investigates how organization-public dialogical communication (OPDC) about CSR and the organizational leaders’ facilitation behavior towards employee CSR engagement influence employees’ perceptions of two different distinct types of organization-public relationships (OPRs), i.e., communal and exchange relationships. Structural equation modeling results of 660 on-line survey responses suggest that OPDC has a positive association with communal relationship and negative association with exchange relationship. Facilitation behavior positively contributes to employee exchange relationships. Both communal and exchange relationships are positively associated with employees’ positive megaphoning. Whereas negative megaphoning is negatively linked with communal relationships and positively linked with employees’ exchange relationships with the companies. This study contributes to the growing body of literature on internal CSR communication and management. More importantly, this study uncovers nuanced effects of CSR on internal public communal and exchange relationship building.

Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • Edson Tandoc Jr; Pei Wen Wong, Nanyang Technological; Chen Lou; Hyunjin Kang, Wee Kim Wee School of Communication & Information, Nanyang Technological U; Shruti Malviya, Wee Kim Wee School of Communication & Information, Nanyang Technological U • EXTENDED ABSTRACT: Public Communication in the Age of Fake News • The rise of fake news has posed threats to societies around the world, affecting various institutions. One area that has not been sufficiently explored is how it has affected public communication. This study examines how the rise of fake news has affected the roles, resources, and routines of public communicators in Singapore. Through in-depth interviews, this research explores how various communication officers across Singapore’s government agencies perceive, and respond to, the fake news crisis.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Brooke Witherow, Hood College • The role of community and social capital in community building • While the role of social capital in community building has been discussed previously, the terms community and community building are rarely defined (e.g. Dodd et al., 2015; Jin & Lee, 2013; Sommerfeldt 2013a, 2013b). This qualitative case study examines the role of community and social capital in community building through community policing. 26 semi-structured interviews with police administration, patrol officers, and community leaders were conducted. The interviews with patrol officers occurred during seven ride-alongs.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Leping You; Linda Hon, University of Florida; Yu-Hao Lee • Examining Value Congruence and Outcome-relevant involvement as Antecedents of Corporate Political Advocacy • Drawing from the theoretical foundation of corporate political advocacy (CPA), this study aims to understand value congruence and outcome-relevant involvement as the antecedents of CPA that companies should consider when taking a stance on contentious sociopolitical issues. This study conducted a 2 x 2 online experiment to examine how both antecedents affect consumers’ attitudinal evaluation on the credibility and legitimacy of a CPA and predict consumers’ supportive behavioral intentions toward a CPA.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • April YUE, University of Connecticut • Navigating change in the Era of COVID-19: The Role of Top Leaders’ Charismatic Rhetoric and Employees’ Organizational Identification • “The Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has had tremendous and swift effects on organizational change. This study examined how organizations can leverage leadership and employee resources to facilitate positive change outcomes. Drawing from the self-concept based motivational theory of charismatic leadership and substitutes for leadership theory, the current study proposed a theoretical model connecting top leaders’ charismatic rhetoric, employees’ affective commitment to change, and employees’ turnover intention. Furthermore, the study investigated contingencies that may modify the relationship between leadership communication and followers’ outcomes. Results from an online panel of 417 U.S. employees showed that top leaders’ use of charismatic rhetoric during change led to followers’ affective commitment to change, which decreased their turnover intention. Furthermore, employees’ organizational identification moderated this relationship. When employees have low identification with their organizations, top leaders’ charismatic rhetoric to address the immediate change is more needed.

Keywords: leadership communication, charismatic rhetoric, change communication, organizational identification, affective commitment, turnover intention”

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Xueying Zhang, North Carolina A&T State; Ziyuan Zhou, Bentley University • The influence of issue attitude on consumers’ reaction toward corporate social advocacy: A moderated mediation path through cognitive dissonance • Corporate social advocacy (CSA) has gained increasing attention in public relations research. The psychological mechanisms regarding how consumers react to a CSA position that conflicts with their own have not yet been examined. Employing cognitive dissonance theory, this study examines how consumers’ preexisting attitude toward an issue influences their reaction to CSA through cognitive dissonance. An experiment (study1) and a survey (study 2) were conducted on Qualtrics with participants recruited from MTurk. Gay marriage rights and gun control issue were chosen as the CSA topics. The results indicated that a conflict between a consumer’s preexisting attitude and a corporation’s stance on a controversial issue leads to cognitive dissonance. Dissonance mediates consumers’ responses to counter-attitudinal CSA, in terms of perceiving the company as biased and intending to boycott the company. Value involvement and CCI significantly moderated the effect of consumers’ attitudes toward CSA on cognitive dissonance, but the effect varies between the two issues. The results help PR practitioners to better understand the segmented consumer audiences and provide a few pieces of practical advice to minimize the potential risk of expressing advocacy on a position of a controversial social political issue.

Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Ziyuan Zhou, Bentley University; Chuqing Dong, Michigan State University • Matching words with actions: Understanding the effects of CSA stance-action consistency on negative consumer responses • Corporation social advocacy (CSA) is a popular topic in public relations research. However, few studies have considered the issue of consistency between corporations taking a stance on a controversial issue and acting accordingly. This study proposed a new concept, CSA stance-action consistency, to investigate the negative consumer responses when corporations violate their CSA promises. A 4 × 2 between-subject experiment indicated that CSA stance-action consistency significantly predicted negative word-of-mouth and boycott intentions. Besides, social issue activism moderated such an effect, while CSA record did not. This study added one more piece of evidence on the risks of CSA and encouraged corporations to fully understand stakeholders’ expectations of CSA before getting involved with controversial issues.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Ayman Alhammad, University of Kansas • How China used Twitter to Repair Its Image amid the COVID-19 Crisis • “In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, many countries have suffered in different ways politically, economically, and socially because of this health crisis. China registered the first case of COVID-19 and found itself the recipient of negative publicity, some of which, stated by scientists, blamed China for the virus in a Wuhan laboratory, or covered the nature of the disease until it was out of control (Verma, 2020). Because of comprehensive widely negative consequences, China’s image has been distorted in many countries. That led the Chinese government to use a different medium to deal with the crisis, one of which is social media platforms. As Saudi Arabia is one of China’s important economic partners, Beijing is concerned that health crises could affect negatively its economic interests in Saudi Arabia. In fact, China has faced serious obstacles in terms of import and export goods (Hayakawa & Mukunoki, 2021).

China decided to employ digital diplomacy by making its ambassadors communicate with the local and international communities (Brandt & Schafer, 2020). Chinese ambassador, Chen Weiqing, speaks to Saudis via Twitter as Saudi Arabia is ranked eighth in the world with 12.45 million users (Statista, 2020).

This paper examines the image repair strategies that the Chinese ambassador in Saudi Arabia employed during the coronavirus pandemic to restore China’s image there. This study adopted rhetorical analysis, building on the theoretical framework proposed by Brinson & Benoit (1999).

An examination of the ambassador’s tweets revealed a variety of image restoration strategies, including denial, bolstering, compensation, and minimization.”

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Zahedur Arman, Southern Illinois University Carbondale • The Networked Huawei Agendas during the US-China Trade War: The Interrelationships between Huawei, the News Media, and Public Tweets • This study examines interrelationships between the networked Huawei agendas, the U.S. and Chinese news media agendas, and Twitter users’ issue agendas on Twitter during the US-China Trade War. Social network analysis is used as a theory and method to analyze Huawei’s public relations activities on Twitter, news media, and Twitter users’ network. This study found that Huawei’s direct networked agenda setting to Twitter users is more successful than the news media’s networked agenda-setting to the Twitter users. This study is among the first to explore cross-nation networked agenda building and networked agenda setting effects on Twitter. It also found that the US media did not follow Huawei’s networked agendas, but the Chinese media followed the corporation’s issue agendas during the US-China trade war. The theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Bugil Chang, University of Minnesota • I Distrust You All Because One of You Did Something Wrong: Spillover Effect of Distrust Elicited by an NPO’s Crisis on Overall NPOs • This study examined how public distrust formed by the crisis of an NPO spills over to other organizations in the same and different sectors through experiment. Overall, when faced with a crisis, the participants distrusted not only organizations in the same sector as the crisis-stricken organization but also organizations in a different sector. The effect was fully mediated by participants’ perceived distrust toward the crisis-stricken organization.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Enzhu Dong, University of Miami; Dongqing Xu • From CSR to Employees’ Megaphoning Behavior: The Roles of Communal Relationship and Corporate Reputation • This study examined how employees’ perceived overall CSR activities impact employees’ positive megaphoning through the mediation of employees’ perceived communal relationship and communal willingness, taking the moderation effect of perceived reputation into consideration. To address the hypotheses, a survey among employees across different organizations was conducted. Results of the moderated mediation examination supported the hypotheses. These findings contributed to the understanding of CSR effects on employee communication behavior and provided implications for organizational management.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Yoosun Ham, Indiana University; Ejae Lee, Indiana University; Eugene Kim, The Media School, Indiana University Bloomington; Sung Hyun Lee • Examining Publics’ Comparative Evaluations of Government Communication and Strength Ties as Predictors of Country Reputation • During the COVID-19 outbreak, media tended to report on how different Asian countries — China, Japan, and South Korea — were handling the situation by using comparisons. U.S. citizens have been exposed to information about Asian countries and could compare and evaluate how those countries’ governments communicate with their citizens to help contain the new coronavirus. This study attempted to examine how country reputation could be associated with publics’ comparative evaluations about the dialogic communication competency of a foreign country’s government through news media exposure about how that government contained and/or mitigated the new coronavirus. This study also investigated associations between the perceived tie strength between the U.S. and Asian countries and those countries’ reputations. This study used online experimental surveys. Its findings suggest that country reputation was significantly associated with comparative evaluations about mutuality and openness in Asian countries’ government dialogic communication and perceived tie strength with the U.S. government. Theoretical implications and practical contributions are discussed.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Jie Jin, University of Florida • Can CEO Activism be Good for the Organization? The Way CEO Activism on Sexual Orientation Equality Achieves High Young Employee Work Engagement • “Whether a CEO should speak out about controversial issues is a hotly debated topic across the United States. In today’s politically polarized environment, Americans have changed their expectations about whether companies and CEOs should lead social change. Contrary to the conventional wisdom that CEOs shouldn’t avoid taking actions unrelated to their business, the purpose of this study is to examine how CEOs’ pro-sexual orientation equality statements may lead to young employee work engagement from the perspective of social exchange theory. A conceptual model with nine propositions is proposed to reveal how CEO activism generates positive employee outcomes.

Keywords: CEO activism, sexual orientation equality, work engagement, social exchange theory”

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Nana Kwame Osei Fordjour, University of New Mexico; Timothy Kwakye Karikari, University of International Business and Economic, Beijing, China • Twitter styles by the leaders of the 116th US House: A concurrent triangulation • Situating our study in the context of a global pandemic and a time of seeming polarization in the US, we analyzed the tweets (n = 480) of Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy. We employ the concurrent triangulation approach and blend three theoretical approaches to analyze their credit-claiming behavior, position-taking, attacks as well as the salient frames in their tweets. Findings indicate there is no significant difference in their position-taking and credit-claiming tweets, however, Majority Leader McCarthy tweeted more negatively than Speaker Pelosi. We uncover four salient frames which are: Economic debate, electoral integrity, COVID-19 response, and the appointment of Supreme Court Justice. Ultimately, we juxtapose the qualitative frames with the quantitative findings to give deeper understanding into the three quantitative categories and provide insights into the implications of such tweets.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Michelle Rossi • How has the United Nations portrayed International Women’s Day before and after founding UN Women? • By applying feminist theory and framing for public relations, this research explored the range of debate within press releases distributed about International Women’s Day before and after the founding of the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, UN Women, in 2011. Using Ethnographic Content Analysis (ECA), this study found that press releases were more descriptive about events in the decade before, and more focused on actions in the decade after.

Research Paper • Student • Student competition • Dongqing Xu • Different Brands Stealing Thunder: How Brand Personality Impacts Crisis Response Strategy Choice • This study aimed to examine the impact of brand personality on participants’ brand perceptions and crisis response evaluation. To be more specific, the study aimed to examine how stealing thunder (i.e., brands disclosing the crisis and response before revealed by the third-party) as a proactive response strategy could impact brands with different personalities in crises. Employing a 2 (brand personality: sincere vs. exciting) × 2 (crisis response type: proactive vs. reactive) experimental design, the study found the buffering effect of sincere brand personality on participants’ perceived credibility, brand attitude, and purchase intention in crisis. In terms of crisis performance evaluations, brand personality was found moderating the effectiveness of the stealing thunder strategy, such that stealing thunder lost its power when employed by a sincere brand. These findings contributed to the extant brand personality literature and suggested a potential boundary of the stealing thunder strategy.

Research Paper • Faculty • Teaching competition • Virginia Harrison, Clemson University • Teaching Philanthropy: How Can Public Relations Courses Prepare Future Fundraisers and Motivate Giving? • Scholars have suggested that fundraising education is a specialty of public relations. This study examines how a fundraising-specific service-learning project may help prepare future fundraisers. A survey of qualitative and quantitative data was administered to public relations students in a fundraising-focused class and in other service-learning classes. Students in the fundraising-focused class were more knowledgeable about nonprofits but were not more inclined to enter the profession. However, they were more motivated to donate after graduation.

Research Paper • Faculty • Teaching competition • KiYong Kim • Dynamic Capabilities and Social Media Education: Professional Expectations and Curricular Preparation • “When Covid-19 impacted regular communication dynamics for organizations, social media became even more prominent in brand communications. A growing body of research confirms training in social media is an essential part of knowing “”how to”” reach one’s organization’s publics (Kruset et al., 2018; Plowman et al., 2015), making social media a mainstay in the public relations educational curriculum (Meganck et al., 2020). This study seeks to bridge the themes found by Kim (2021) related to public relations practice and dynamic capabilities (Teece, 2007) with social media educational practices. This study suggests that there is a link between dynamic capabilities and social media educational practices.

Keywords

Dynamic Capabilities, Social media education, public relations professionals, Case studies, scenarios, experiential learning, digital leadership, VUCA”

Research Paper • Faculty • Teaching competition • Amanda Weed, Kennesaw State University; Adrienne Wallace, Grand Valley State University; Betsy Emmons, Samford University; Alisa Agozzino, Ohio Northern University • Leveling the Playing Field: Assessing Issues of Equity, Transparency, and Experiential Learning in the PRSSA Bateman Case Study Competition • This study provides the first academic research examination about the Public Relations Student Society of America Bateman Case Study Competition. Research-based insights identify varying perspectives on if the competition meets current students’ needs. Through insights gained from a survey of faculty and professional advisers of 2017-2020 Bateman competition teams, the authors have identified critical perspectives and areas for improvement to the competition along the issues of equity, transparency, and experiential learning. Study results address alignment of knowledge, skills, and abilities identified by the Commission on Public Relations Education and university curricula.

<2021 Abstracts

Advertising Division

2021 Abstracts

Graduate and Undergraduate Student Research • Industry Views on Enhancing Digital Advertising • Research Paper • Agrawal, Ritika • Advertisers of the industry that were once referred to as “Mad Men” are now incorporating data and becoming the “Math Men.” Marketers’ interest in data and analytics has increased from 8% to 12% in the past five years (Forrester, 2021). However, consumers are often reluctant participants in the use of their personal data for advertising targeting and messaging. This study uses social exchange theory to explore the process through which data are used in digital advertising to improve the e-consumer experience. Through in-depth interviews with executives from leading entertainment and media companies, advertising agencies, and tech firms, the researcher offers three attributes that may improve the ad experience for e-consumers: transparency, relevant and engaging imagery, and frequency of retargeting.

Graduate and Undergraduate Student Research • It’s OK to Not Feel OK; Representations of Mental Health in Advertising • Research Paper • Buckley, Christen, Pennsylvania State University • COVID-19 has wreaked havoc on mental health in the United States. In response, advertisements are incorporating representations of the mental health crisis. Using textual analysis to evaluate four television advertisements, (two pre COVID, two post COVID) from two brands, HBO and Headspace, this study investigates the key similarities/differences between the pre versus post COVID ads, and the key similarities/differences between the differing brands’ post COVID ads. Implications of mental health representations in advertisements are discussed

Graduate and Undergraduate Student Research • Advertising During the Pandemic: The Influence of Susceptibility and Severity on “COVID-19 Appeal” Perceptions and Advertising Effectiveness • Extended Abstract • Piacentine, Colin, University of South Carolina • The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between consumer perceptions of COVID-19 and the effects of advertisements using COVID-19 appeals (as defined in this study). Using an online survey, persuasion knowledge, perceived manipulativeness, and attributions (public- or self-serving) will be observed as mediating variables between susceptibly and severity (IVs) and attitudes and behaviors resulting from exposure to the advertisement (DVs). Implication will be discussed.

Graduate and Undergraduate Student Research • McAds: Where Collectivism and Culture Collide • Research Paper • Ryan, Erin, Kennesaw State University • Cultural differences can be difficult for people on a personal level, but for a brand it is vital to learn how to understand these differences in order to run a successful business. American fast-food brands have had to learn how to deal with these differences when doing business in China. They struggle between keeping their original standardization from the US and knowing when to implement a more localized plan for their ventures in China. Many fast-food brands have tried and failed to open a successful business in China due to lack of knowledge of Chinese culture. One brand that has successfully integrated themselves into China is McDonald’s, with some people even having “weddings” in them. They appear to have found the balance between standardization, localization, and knowledge of the cultural differences between American individualism and Chinese collectivism. They implemented this knowledge in their marketing and product selection, and this study illustrates this by examining menu differences and advertisements to the Chinese populace. This study helps pave the way for future research into ways in which American brands can successfully market to the Chinese audience.

Graduate and Undergraduate Student Research • Humanity for Sale! A Textual Analysis of Zain’s “Mr. President” Commercial • Research Paper • Sonbul, Raghad, The University of Southern Mississippi • This paper analyzed media representation of Muslims through a textual analysis of Zain’s commercial in Ramadan 2018. It examines the commercial through the lenses of myths, Marxist theory, and hegemony, as well as Stuart Hall’s levels of analyzing media–“preferred, negotiated and oppositional” readings. The aim of the study was to evaluate the media representation of Muslims from a different perspective than the dominant stereotypes and to examine media effects on audiences. The findings indicated that the commercial was a response to President Trump’s determination that it is time to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, as well as other Arabs issues. The company used the Arab issues to reach millions of people around the world, draw attention and gain profits. However, the commercial raised a debate on social media among supporters and opponents.

Graduate and Undergraduate Student Research • When Deception Backfires: Attitudinal and Chilling Effects of Targeted Advertising on Social Media • Research Paper • Stubenvoll, Marlis • The following experiment (N = 340) investigates whether individuals activate three dimensions of persuasion knowledge – perceived persuasive intent, perceived manipulative intent, and targeting knowledge – in response to targeted (versus not targeted) ads and the original sponsorship disclosure (versus no disclosure) on Facebook. Results suggest that individuals’ evaluation of targeted ads as manipulative sparks negative brand evaluations. Moreover, perceptions of manipulative intent could cause chilling effects, through which individuals might restrict their online behaviors.

Graduate and Undergraduate Student Research • Virtual or Real?: A Comparative Study on Virtual-influencer- vs. Celebrity- endorsed CSR Message • Extended Abstract • Yang, Jeongwon • Conducting an online experiment with a design of 2×2 between subjects, the study aims to 1) examine the roles of source credibility and source-message fit in enhancing the persuasiveness of messages, by comparing the CSR posts of virtual influencer and celebrity endorsement; and 2) make an interdisciplinary effort to explore an effectiveness of a non-human agent like a virtual influencer in promoting brand equity by drawing virtual reality (VR), influencer marketing, and CSR.

Graduate and Undergraduate Student Research • Consumer Responses to CSR during the Pandemic: Investigating the Role of Context/cause Fit and Attribution of Motives in Cause-related Marketing • Research Paper • Zheng, Huatian • The study set out to explore the effect of context/cause fit and attribution of CSR motives on consumers’ responses, and whether cause involvement moderates the process during the COVID-19 pandemic. By using convenience samplings, the present study adopted a 2 × 2 between-subject experiment in which 146 college students were randomly exposed to one of four different CRM ads. The findings implied that exposure to high context/cause fit CRM ads encourages generally positive consumers’ responses. Although attribution of motives did not significantly influence participants’ judgement, the way participants perceive the motives behind CRM ads instead of the pre-existing motive shapes their attitude and purchase intention. Due to the special nature of the pandemic, most participants indicated a high involvement status, resulting in no significant moderating role for cause involvement. Surprisingly, female participants tend to be more sensitive to firm-serving motives and favorable to public-serving CRM ads compared to males.

Open Research • Demystify Computer Generated Influencers: The Role of Perceived Anthropomorphism and Social Presence on Audience’s Attitudes toward CGI’s Sponsored Posts and the Endorsed Brands • Extended Abstract • Ahn, Regina, University of Miami • This study explores how the perceived humanness of computer-generated imagery (CGI) influencers is associated with consumers’ attitudes toward the brand-sponsored posts and the endorsed brand. Our online survey with Gen Z consumers showed that both perceived anthropomorphism and social presence of CGI influencers positively influence consumer evaluation outcomes via the mediators of perceived physical and social attractiveness of the CGI.

Open Research • Chinese Consumer Resistance and Coping Strategies to Live Stream Shopping • Extended Abstract • Ahn, Regina, University of Miami • Given the explosive growth of live streaming shopping in China, it is critical to explore young consumers’ persuasion knowledge and their coping strategies towards live streaming shopping. Our study aims to understand Chinese consumers’ resistance regarding live streaming experience on e-commerce platforms. Twenty participants were recruited in a local Chinese university to conduct semi-structured in-depth interviews. The study captures several factors that evoke Chinese consumers’ annoyance and counterargument against live streaming tactics, platforms, and sellers.

Open Research • Why Do We Click on Clickbait? Read on to Find Out Why Persuasion Knowledge Matters • Research Paper • Buteau, Emily, University of North Dakota • This study tested the moderating role in the effects of clickbait ad type and metadiscourse characteristics on attitudes and intentions toward clickbait advertising. The findings from a two-part experiment indicated that persuasion knowledge moderated the relationship between the effects of clickbait ad type and metadiscourse characteristic on intention to share the ad. Participants with high persuasion knowledge generated higher intentions when shown evidential metadiscourse and more negative intentions when shown exaggeration clickbait. Implications are discussed.

Open Research • The role of product fit and brand fit on brand co-appearances in television programs • Research Paper • Chan, Fanny, Fong Yee The Hang Seng University of Hong Kong • Brand clutter has gradually extended from traditional advertising to less conventional marketing communication tools. Although brand co-appearance in media content is likely to continue to proliferate, little is known about the phenomenon and its effects. Building on research related to co-branding and comparative advertising, this study systematically examined the moderating role of brand fit and product fit on the effectiveness of brand co-appearance on television programs. Several pre-tests and four experimental studies were conducted. It was found that product fit and brand fit significantly moderated attitudes and purchase intention toward the coappearing products. The empirical results have significant theoretical and practical implications for the field, which are discussed together with the research avenues.

Open Research • Brand activism and political consumerism: Understanding determinants of consumers’ buycotting and boycotting behaviors in the context of brand activism • Extended Abstract • Cho, Moonhee • The study examined the factors influencing consumers’ boycotting and buycotting intentions in response to brand activism. Conducting an online experimental study among 367 consumers, this study found that the consumer-brand stance congruence significantly influenced consumers’ attitude toward the brand, boycotting, and buycotting intentions. The study also revealed moderating effects of issue involvement and brand trust while these moderating effects vary by the product involvement categories. The mediating role of consumer-brand identification was also found.

Open Research • Understanding Ad-block Wall and Its Effects on Online Publisher and Advertising through Psychological Reactance • Research Paper • Chung, Un Chae, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign • As nearly one third of online users installed ad-blockers, websites relying heavily on the advertising revenue try to overcome this threat by installing ad-block wall on their website, which hinders users from accessing website’s contents. To understand the psychological process of website users when facing this wall, the paper adopted psychological reactance theory and found that different level of ad-block wall can generate different level of reactance outcomes and attitudes.

Open Research • Advertising in the times of COVID: A Tight-Loose Analysis of Pandemic-Related TV Commercials • Research Paper • Dodoo, Naa Amponsah, Emerson College • This research explores normative beliefs advocated in the earliest stage of COVID-19 awareness campaigns. The exploration utilizes Tight-Loose Theory and the Hofstede’s dimensions as frameworks to analyze advertisements run from March to June 2020. A content analysis (n=377) found that ad appeals and themes did not strictly follow the predicted expectations of the U.S.’s dominate cultural orientation. This research establishes a benchmark for comparison with the evolutionary stages of COVID-19 advertising.

Open Research • A Literature Review of Influencer Marketing and Research Agenda: From a Social Network Analysis Perspective • Research Paper • Feng, Yang, San Diego State University • The amount of literature on influencer marketing has increased dramatically in recent years. Although extant literature provides valuable insights into the mechanisms of influencer marketing, several research gaps remain, such as inconclusive findings and a lack of a holistic understanding of the endorsement process of influencer marketing. To address the research gaps, we performed a social network analysis (SNA) of findings from 46 journal articles that included 54 distinct studies using Gephi, a network visualization tool. The SNA results revealed seven topic communities and six most important bridging variables (i.e., influencer trustworthiness, parasocial interaction, influencer credibility, brand trust, influencer attachment, and message credibility) in the literature. On the basis of the SNA results and the meaning transfer model, we proposed an integrative theoretical framework to illustrate the independent, mediating, and outcome variables of the endorsement process of influencer marketing. A future research agenda on influencer marketing was also proposed and discussed.

Open Research • Kidfluencing: The Role of Selling Intent, Logo Presence, and Disclosure Modality on Parental Appraisals • Research Paper • Freeman, Jason, Brigham Young University • Kidfluencers are emerging as valuable brand partners, capable of facilitating engaging peer-to-peer interactions with other child viewers. The current experimental study focuses on the role of disclosure modality, selling intent, and logo presence on parental reactions to kidfluencer content. Findings suggest that the negative consequences of advertising recognition can be ameliorated through sponsorship transparency. However, for some parents, advertising recognition led to greater perceptions of negativity, resulting in unfavorable outcomes. These results suggest that advertising recognition can have diverging consequences, depending the evaluation of the message. Advertising recognition acted as the primary predictor of outcomes related to perceptions of appropriateness of the sponsored content, attitudes toward the brand, purchase intention, and desire to regulate. Practical and theoretical implications are discussed.

Open Research • Native Ads in the Neighborhood: Sponsored Posts Versus User-Generated Content on Nextdoor • Extended Abstract • Johnson, Benjamin, University of Florida • This study examines how older adults on the neighborhood-oriented app Nextdoor respond to native advertisements. A within-subjects experiment compared social posts, native ads, and traditional ads. Outcomes included credibility, fear emotion, persuasion knowledge, ad attitude, brand attitude, and purchase intentions. Differences were found in favor of social posts (i.e., posts from neighbors). Native ads were evaluated as more similar to traditional ads than social posts. Finally, the study examines potential mediation and moderation.

Open Research • Seeing a New Self in Dadvertisements: Responses to Ads and Fatherhood Anxiety • Research Paper • Johnson, Benjamin, University of Florida • Advertising portrayals of fathers have the potential to influence new fathers’ self-perceptions. A 2×2 experiment of 269 men, aged 25-40, compared new fathers’ with non- or established fathers’ emotional response, anxiety, and boundary expansion to dad-targeted advertisements. Emotions and perceptions of the “dad in the ad” were proposed to mediate effects on the persuasiveness of the advertisement. The research found that new fathers felt more anxiety, which produced greater boundary expansion and wishful identification.

Open Research • Contoured and In Control: African-American Women, Beauty Brand Representation, and Consumer Satisfaction • Research Paper • Johnson, Benjamin, University of Florida • Beauty brands such as makeup lines continue to struggle with representing the full diversity of women in their products and advertising. This study is a survey of African-American women aged 25-49, in which they provided their perceptions of 10 popular makeup brands. Self-determination theory was used to demonstrate how seeing one’s self represented in products and advertising increases feelings of autonomy, competence, and relatedness, and how this translates positively into consumer attitudes and behavior.

Open Research • The Role of Perceived Interactivity and User Gratifications to Use Live-Streaming Commerce • Research Paper • Joo, Eunsin • Live-streaming commerce has recently emerged as a popular selling channel that encourages consumer interaction and participation while shopping online. The purpose of this study was to investigate how consumers’ perceived interactivity influences the use and purchase intents of live streaming commerce, while exploring the mediating roles of cognitive and affective motivation in the relationships. A scenario-based survey study of 187 American consumers was conducted via Prolific.co. The results showed that perceived interactivity in the live-streaming commerce significantly influenced consumers’ usage intention of live-streaming commerce and purchase intention of the recommended products through live-streaming commerce. Specifically, results showed that perceived utility and enjoyment were significant mediators in between the perceived interactivity and consumers’ usage intention of live-streaming commerce. And perceived enjoyment also plays a significant mediating role in between the perceived interactivity and consumers’ purchase intention. Theoretical and managerial implications, limitations and future studies are also discussed.

Open Research • Investigating the Marketing Effectiveness of Virtual Influencers • Research Paper • Kiew, Siu Ting Josie • Guided by the Uses and Gratification approach along with the Uncanny Valley Theory, this study sought to understand the phenomenon of virtual influencers. Based on an in-depth interview with 26 participants who are following virtual influencers, this study identified user motivations – including information motivation, entertainment motivation, surveillance, aesthetics, and social identification – for following. We also found that followers perceive virtual influencers as uncanny and eerie. However, followers expressed acceptance towards virtual influencers where authenticity, human-likeness, and self-justification were found to mitigate the effects of the uncanny valley. Finally, in terms of its role in advertising effectiveness, we found that virtual influencers are effective for building brand image and brand awareness but lack persuasive ability to incite purchase intentions. The findings advanced extant literature on user motivations for following virtual influencers in the new edge of social media influencers, provided insights on mitigating factors of the uncanny valley, as well as delineated the efficacy of virtual influencers in advertising campaigns.

Open Research • Rhetorical Devices in Agency Philosophies: An Analysis of Rhetorical Figures in Slogans of Top Ranking Agencies for Creativity and Effectiveness • Research Paper • Makady, Heidi, University of Florida • Rhetorical figures in slogans are one way agencies emphasize their philosophies. This study explores the use of textual rhetorical figures in agency philosophies of top ranking WARC agencies. In line with the advertising taxonomy framework, content analysis indicated that irregular models (tropes) were most frequently used. Slogan length and semantic complexity were also positively correlated with WARC creativity scores. The sampling frame for this study is the WARC 2019 – 2020 effectiveness and creativity global rankings.

Open Research • Adding or Averaging? How Weak Arguments Influence the Persuasive Effects of Strong Arguments • Research Paper • Obermaier, Magdalena • Mostly relying on a “the-more-the-better” heuristic, persuasive communication research has rarely scrutinized the effects of the mutual presentation of weak and strong arguments. Building on research on judgment formation, we conducted four experimental studies on political and health-related topics and demonstrated that providing supporting arguments of moderate strength along with a strong argument increases persuasion (adding). However, presenting weak supporting arguments along with a strong argument reduces the persuasive effect of the strong argument (averaging).

Open Research • Exploring the Influence of Advertising Spokesperson’s Racial Identity and Product Type Endorsed on Consumer Decision-Making • Research Paper • PIERRE, LOUVINS, University of Connecticut • Limited research has examined how racially diverse models in advertising influence consumers’ decision-making process. This research tested how spokespersons’ racial identity and the product type they endorsed influenced evaluation of spokesperson attributes and consumer behavior. Results showed that spokespersons’ race had a significant effect on all variables, but product type only affected purchase intention. A path model also tested how the interrelations between spokesperson attributes, product involvement and information-seeking contributed to explain purchase intention.

Open Research • Native Twitter Ads: Testing the role of Media Format and Disclosure • Research Paper • PIERRE, LOUVINS, University of Connecticut • Native advertising is now a common strategy that marketers utilize to advertise effectively. This study used an experimental 3 (text only, text plus image, or video) X 2 (disclosure: present/absent between-subjects design (N = 322) to test how media format and disclosure influence attitudes and behavioral intentions. Results show that only media format has a main effect, such that richer media (videos) help to reduce persuasion knowledge. Moreover, skepticism, intrusiveness, and persuasion knowledge negatively predict attitudes, while manipulativeness predicts both attitudes and share intention. This study is one of the first to examine media format and disclosure, and by implication conclude rich media with disclosure help advertising effectiveness.

Open Research • Seeker or Sentry? Consumers’ Coping Mechanism with Third-Party Cookie Driven Advertising: Multidimensional Persuasion Knowledge Perspective • Research Paper • Seok, Ayoung • Majority of digital advertising is delivered by third-party cookie-based targeting technology, but little is known how consumers cope with this unique persuasion technology. To fill the gap, this study integrated multidimensional persuasion knowledge, tactic evaluation, and target response strategy into a model. Employing an online survey (N=204), this study found that conceptual persuasion knowledge was both directly and indirectly associated with sentry or seeker strategy via evaluative persuasion knowledge and tactic evaluations. Implications are discussed.

Open Research • To Tell or Not to Tell: Effects of AI-powered Virtual Try-on Feature and Transparency on Brand Attitudes and Purchase Intentions • Research Paper • Sun, Yuan • Through an online experiment (N = 204) where users virtually tried on products recommended from an augmented reality (AR) site, we found that AR experience positively affected product and brand attitudes through vividness and immersion while it also triggered perceived intrusiveness. Being transparent about data collection increased the privacy protection perception and mitigated perceived intrusiveness. Transparency perception functioned as a crucial antecedent of trust, which was moderated by users’ initial belief in artificial intelligence.

Open Research • Extended Abstract: Examining Employee Reception of Corporate Social Advocacy Communicated by Leadership: Effects on Employee-Organization Relationships and Work Engagement • Extended Abstract • Tackett, Teresa • The advertising industry engaged in corporate social advocacy (CSA) in response to #CommitToChange, which demanded meaningful action from advertising industry leaders regarding lack of BIPOC representation. Organizations have an obligation to understand how CSA efforts impact internal publics, as well as traditionally studied external perceptions. An online survey examines a sample of employees who work at creative agencies, and attitudes toward their agency’s (lack of) participation, communication and leadership authenticity, employee-organization relationships and work engagement.

Open Research • Pride and Prejudice and Country-of-Origin Ecological Images • Research Paper • Xiao, Min • Consumer demand for eco-friendly products is increasing. To respond to the increasing demand, brands and marketers are offering more products that they claim to be green or eco-friendly. Nowadays, many consumers purchase eco-friendly products online. However, it is very difficult for consumers to verify the validity or credibility of green claims of a product listed on online stores because marketers may not provide any evidence to support their green claims and consumers may lack the ability to authenticate the validity of the claims by themselves. Hence, consumers may have no better choice but to rely on information cues, such as the country-of-origin (COO) or the price of a product, to help them evaluate the credibility of green claims. Two online experiments were conducted to examine how product COO, product price, and product involvement affect consumer perception of product greenness and green claim credibility. The findings suggest that product COO exerts an overwhelming influence on consumer perception.

Open Research • (Extended Abstract) Helping A Friend in Need: A Study of Facebook Fundraisers • Extended Abstract • Xue, Fei • Based on Social Impact Theory, the current research examined the effects of different types of Facebook fundraising posts on perceived source credibility, attitude toward the post, intention to click, intention to share, and intention to donate. Three factors of social influence were investigated – relationship strength, immediacy of needs, and number of donations. Main effects were found for immediacy of needs and number of donations. Interaction effects were found in perceived credibility and intention to click.

Open Research • “Do Good and Be ‘Liked’”: Corporate Messaging on Social Media During COVID-19 and Consumer Responses • Research Paper • Yang, Jing • This study explores the types of corporate messaging on social media during the outbreak of COVID-19 in the U.S., and its corresponding differences in consumer engagement, attitude, and brand trust. Two independent studies were conducted. In Study 1, we content analyzed corporations’ social media posts and found four types of corporate messaging, namely, internal corporate social responsibility (CSR), external CSR, promotional CSR, and company statement. Among all, internal CSR received the highest consumers’ behavioral engagement as compared to the others. In Study 2, we adopted an online-experimental design to further valid and extend the findings of Study 1. Results showed significant differences among the types of corporate messaging in driving consumers’ behavioral engagement intention, brand attitude and brand trust. Robustly, promotional CSR was the least effective corporate messaging across all. Theoretical contributions, managerial implications and future study directions are also discussed towards the end.

Open Research • Using Funny Memes in Social Media Advertising: The Moderating Role of Bandwagon Cues • Research Paper • Yang, Guolan • The study conducted a 2 (image type: funny meme vs. serious image) x 2 (level of bandwagon cue: high vs. low) between-subjects online experiment (N = 258). Results showed that using memes was more effective than using serious images in the setting of brand-related Twitter posts. Consumers perceived the meme post as humorous, which in turn resulted in positive attitudes toward the post and greater intention to share the post on social media. Furthermore, bandwagon cues moderated the meme effect on persuasion through perceived humor. Consumers’ humor perception was enhanced when they were exposed to a meme post with a large number of likes, comments, and retweets. This study used funny memes as humor stimuli, extending the humor literature to social media advertising. Plus, it illustrated the importance of bandwagon effects for humor persuasion.

Open Research • Realistic skin vs. Flawless skin: An investigation of the appeal of retouch-free advertising • Research Paper • Yang, Tingting, Nanyang Technological University, WKWSCI • “Using retouched models in advertisements to embody idealised beauty prototypes in certain cultures (e.g., flawless skin) has been a widely known yet controversial practice. Considering the emerging trend of “”bare skin look”” in advertising, female consumers’ beliefs about ideal beauty (i.e., skin ideal in this study) and the use of retouching may be changing. Guided by the corporate moral responsibility framework, this study conducted an online experiment to assess ad retouching and disclaimers’ effect on advertising effectiveness. A 2 (model skin: realistic skin vs. flawless skin) x 2 (retouch-free disclaimer: present vs. absent) between-subjects online experiment was conducted among Chinese female participants. Results revealed that although preference of flawless skin still drives Chinese female consumers’ purchase intentions, an ad portraying realistic skin model with a retouch-free disclaimer was more sought after for Chinese female consumers, and Ad honesty mediated the interaction effect of model skin and disclaimer on consumers’ purchase intentions. This study’s findings provide theoretical and practical insights into how brands can better appeal to contemporary female Asian consumers.

Open Research • Outdoor-sports Brand Communities on Instagram: How Message Attributes Relate to Consumer Engagement • Research Paper • Zhang, Jennifer Shiyue • Brands are increasingly using social media to build online communities as part of their marketing efforts. The present study analyzes the Instagram strategies used by three global outdoor sports brands and their respective effects on consumer engagement, operationalized as the number of likes and comments received by posts. Content analysis of 957 Instagram posts from Arc’teryx, Salomon, and Patagonia, focused on messages’ textual, visual, and technical attributes, was conducted. Multiple regression indicated that task- and interaction-oriented posts received more likes than self-oriented ones. Messages that were shorter, posted photos rather than videos, presented “cute” visuals, and mentioned other users were also more likely to motivate consumer engagement. These findings’ implications for marketers seeking to develop Instagram strategies that will effectively boost consumer interaction are discussed.

Professional Freedom & Responsibility (PF&R) • Blending Sex-Positivity and Racial Justice Advocacy in Black-Centric Health Advertising: Intersectional Health Communication Targeting High-Risk Black Cisgender Heterosexual and Black LGBTQ Populations Through a HIV Prevention Social Media Campaign • Research Paper • Li, Minjie, The University of Tampa • Health disparity disproportionately impact people of colors, Black LGBTQ members in particular. In order to effectively persuade members from these communities on issues that impact them—such as HIV prevention, health advertising has started to apply the sex-positive approach in their crafting of visual and messaging. Through integrating intersectionality, social identity theory, and distinctiveness theory, the present study examines how different types of sex-positive depictions (i.e., heterosexual, queer) in a Black-centric health advertising campaign interact with audience’s identity to influence the Black cisgender heterosexual Americans and Black LGBTQ-identified Americans’ adaption of the PrEP regimen, advertising perception, and Black identification. Moreover, the study examines how such joint effects might be moderated by the ways in which the campaign incorporate social activism (i.e., intersectional, non-intersectional, no activism). The findings demonstrate that sex-positive depiction indeed interact with audience identity to significantly increase perceived susceptibility to contracting HIV, perceive response efficacy, intention to adopt the PrEP regimen when offered for free, and positive attitudes towards the PrEP ad campaign.

Professional Freedom & Responsibility (PF&R) • A woman’s view from a man’s world: The reality of being female in advertising • Research Paper • Mueller, Sophia, University of Florida • Few studies to date have sought to understand females’ experiences in all departments of an advertising industry. This paper seeks to explore the challenges women have faced in this industry through an analysis of in-depth interviews conducted with 24 practitioners in different agency roles. Interviewees discussed how gender impacted their careers, and their statements were analyzed, revealing five key themes. Implications for advertising practitioners and directions for future research are also addressed.

Professional Freedom & Responsibility (PF&R) • Pressing Issues of Ethnic Diversity in the Ad Industry: The Professionals’ Perspectives • Research Paper • Yang, Fang, Grand Valley State University • “The advertising industry has suffered from lack of ethnic diversity for decades and little progress has been made toward meaningful changes. To probe the reasons for advertising’s diversity lag, in-depth interviews with 17 advertising professionals and a national survey with ad agencies from all 50 states were conducted to gather sentiment and understanding. Research questions ranged from the potential benefits of diversity to the pipeline issue of ethnically diverse talent and the reasons for the persistent imbalance. Emerging insights from this mixed-method study suggest that unconscious bias fueled by political ideology, gender, and size of agency factor into the equation. Suggestions are made to advance ethnic diversity in the advertising workforce with the hope of realizing the many benefits a representative workforce can bring.

Special Topics in Advertising • Sell, Ignore, or Address? Examining Consumers’ Emotional Responses to Different Types of Social Media Influencers’ Posts During the COVID-19 Outbreak • Extended Abstract • Abdollahi, Maral • This study examines consumers’ emotional reactions to different types of social media posts from three types of social media influencers during the COVID-19 outbreak. A computational research method was employed to analyze nine discrete emotions. While followers felt more “relief” toward COVID-related posts from micro-influencers, they also felt more “hate” toward their marketing posts. On the other hand, followers found it more acceptable if mega- and macro-influencers tried to sell something during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Special Topics in Advertising • Social Media Advertising and Big Data at the Intersection: A Diversity Perspective to Interdisciplinary Communication • Research Paper • Chen, Huan, University of Florida • The purpose of this paper is to examine the current status of Big Data research on social media advertising, and investigate obstacles and strategies for effective communication across disciplines. The Big Data approach involves two disciplines: advertising and computer science. Thus, the focus of the studies is collaborative research of these two disciplines. Grounded in the theories of interdisciplinarity, weak and strong communication, interactional expertise, two studies were conducted. Study 1 used LDA+BERT topic modeling, pyLDA and wordcloud visualization, and analyzed 199 abstracts of Big Data advertising research papers from 2016 to 2020. Findings showed a clear trend of incorporating machine learning in interdisciplinary advertising research on social media. Study 2 adopted the perspective of the intercultural workgroup communication theory. By interviewing 20 researchers from each discipline, Study 2 found that there is a lack of adequate listening between the two disciplines. The current remedies rely heavily on a sense of openness at intrapersonal and interpersonal levels, and individual go-betweeners with non-authoritative leadership style and interactional expertise. More scalable solutions have to address the issues of evaluating interdisciplinary research in tenure and promotion systems, and institutionalized platforms for disciplines to mingle with each other.

Special Topics in Advertising • Extended Abstract: What Ad Age’s A-List Agencies Learned from COVID-19: A Phenomenological Approach • Extended Abstract • Hachtmann, Frauke, University of Nebraska-Lincoln • This phenomenology explores how some of the most successful advertising agencies’ senior executives experienced the global health pandemic in 2020 and what they learned from serving clients when consumers were forced into lockdown, brands slashed their media budgets, and social unrest unfolded simultaneously. The study is based on in-depth interview data from 13 individuals who worked in 10 different agencies of varying sizes across the United States and reveals five qualitative meta-themes.

Special Topics in Advertising • Effects of narrative-based corporate message and sponsorship disclosure in native CSR advertising • Research Paper • Han, Jiangxue • There has been a rise in the use of native advertising as a tactic to inform stakeholders of a company’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities. In addition, communicating CSR through storytelling has shown to be effective in generating positive brand attitudes through transportation, identification, and engagement. The present study explores the effects of message format (narrative vs. non-narrative) and disclosure prominence (subtle vs. prominent) when communicating a brand’s CSR initiatives on message effectiveness. The findings showed that a narrative CSR advertising message led to greater identification, transportation, and engagement than a non-narrative CSR advertising message. A message with subtle disclosure led to less ad recognition and more positive message evaluations than a message with prominent disclosure. Ad recognition had a negative impact on message attitude, brand attitude, and purchase intention.

Special Topics in Advertising • Advertising’s Youthful Obsession: How a Valorization of Youthfulness Has Defined the Advertising Industry and Impacted Its Workforce • Research Paper • Windels, Kasey, University of Florida • Advertisers serve as cultural intermediaries, using cultural references to create symbolic meaning for goods. Youthfulness is one highly desirable quality brands mobilize to create a sense of cutting-edge style. Based on in-depth interviews with 22 advertising practitioners, this study examines what youthfulness has come to represent in advertising and how that affects the experiences of workers in the industry. Findings suggest discourses of passion and hunger for younger workers and discourses of datedness and disillusionment for older workers are common. The valorization of youthfulness, along with its related discourses, prompt younger and older workers each to engage in particular forms of immaterial labor, or activities that contribute value, but are outside of the constraints of paid employment. While younger workers must spend considerable time engaging in the immaterial labor of following youthful social media and cultural trends, older workers must engage in immaterial labor to embody youthfulness.

Special Topics in Advertising • Effectiveness of Corporate Social Responsibility Activities in the COVID-19 Pandemic • Research Paper • Zhang, Jueman (Mandy), New York Institute of Technology • This study compared two types of corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities tailored to the COVID-19 pandemic—donation of tailored products and innovative manufacturing of needed supplies with two types of regular CSR activities—donation of regular products and release of CSR commercials regarding two nondurable products companies. The findings revealed that tailored CSR activities resulted in greater differentiation and innovativeness. The two types of tailored CSR activities, together with regular donation were superior to CSR commercials in terms of company function-CSR activity fit, CSR activity dynamic and company image. The impact of CSR activity type on CSR activity dynamic and company sincerity vary depending on the company and its detailed activities. Similar interaction patterns suggest the possible association between dynamic of CSR activities and company sincerity. All types of CSR activities increased the company CSR evaluations, with tailored donation revealing the salient advantage over others. None of the CSR activities improved brand equity.

Teaching and Pedagogy • Extended Abstract: Pinterest Discussions to Support Student Learning in Online Advertising and Media Courses • Extended Abstract • Huntington, Heidi West Texas A&M University • Visual bookmarking app Pinterest, known for its aspirational and consumptive qualities of user’s “pinning” work, has recently made concerted forays into the online advertising and marketing space. At the same time, its visual and collaborative qualities offer unique potential for application in pedagogy. This extended abstract describes a pedagogical assessment study examining a Pinterest-based discussion board series, specifically Pinterest’s role in fostering collaboration and learning in an online digital advertising course.

2021 Abstracts