Social exclusion influences on the effectiveness of altruistic versus egoistic appeals in charitable advertising

Abstract

In three experiments, the authors study charitable behaviors and demonstrate that consumers who feel socially excluded react more positively to altruistic, other appeals rather than egoistic, self-benefit appeals. In Study 1, a child poverty relief campaign with a message persuasiveness variable, consumers who feel socially excluded are more persuaded by other-benefit appeals, but other appeals and self-benefit appeals have equal effects on consumers who feel socially included. Study 2 replicates the findings in a cancer research campaign with an amount-to-donate variable: consumers who feel socially excluded allocate more dollars to the charity in response to other-benefit rather than self-benefit ads, but the effects are not observed among consumers who feel socially included. Study 3, a campaign for providing drinking water, further validates the findings with a donation intentions variable: other-benefit ads rather than self-benefit ads drive consumers who feel socially excluded to be more willing and likely to donate, but the effects are not observed among consumers who feel socially included and those in the baseline control condition.