Abstract
Employing message endorser is a popular strategy in encouraging consumers to protect the environment. This research explores how the social status of endorsers and the forms of normative messages can influence the effectiveness of endorsement for pro-environmental behaviors. Drawing on the focus theory of normative conduct and the match-up hypothesis, the authors propose that the effects of endorser social status on consumers’ responses to green advertising are contingent on whether the normative messages is framed as injunctive norms or descriptive norms. In three experiments, the results indicate that participants show more positive attitudes toward the advertisement and higher intentions to act environmentally friendly when endorsers with high social status are presented in combination with injunctive norm appeals. In contrast, ordinary consumer endorsers produce stronger impact on attitudes and behavioral intentions when descriptive norm appeals are used. These findings show that marketers using endorsers to promote pro-environmental behaviors should develop normative message accordingly.
Highlights
Though substantial research effort has been put into the political and industrial level of environment protection [1], the negative impact of consumption behaviors on the environment can not be underestimated
Based on the match-up hypothesis, which stresses the fit between the endorsers and the endorsed offerings [13], we propose that the effectiveness of endorsers of pro-environmental behaviors with different social statuses will depend on the focus of normative appeals
The work of Griskevicius, Tybur, and Van den Bergh [8] provides further evidence for this inconsistency. They demonstrate that the association between green consumption and social status will be mitigated when related costs are reduced, which suggests that a prevalent pro-environmental behavior as framed in descriptive norms may contradict the symbolic meaning represented by a high social status endorser
Summary
Though substantial research effort has been put into the political and industrial level of environment protection [1], the negative impact of consumption behaviors on the environment can not be underestimated. Status concerns play a key role in motivating green consumption [8] and the symbolic meaning of endorser’s status can be transferred to the endorsed activities [9], we believe that it is of great importance to ascertain how the social status of endorsers would affect consumers’ reactions to pro-environmental appeals. The current research seeks to advance prior research by examining the interplay between endorser social status and normative appeals on endorsement effectiveness in the context of pro-environmental advertising. That is, when the social status of a pro-environmental behavior endorser is congruent with the goals to follow different types of social norms, the endorsement effectiveness will be enhanced. This research represents a preliminary exploration of the question as to how to boost the persuasiveness of pro-environmental advertisements by combining endorsers and normative appeals, and provides theoretical guidance for governments and environmental nonprofit organizations to design more effective advertising. We make some discussions about our findings and provide suggestions for future research
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