UNIVERSITEIT GENT
FACULTEIT POLITIEKE EN SOCIALE WETENSCHAPPEN
ADVERGAMES VERSUS PRODUCT PLACEMENTS:
THE IMPACT OF A MEDIA LITERACY TRAINING ON (UNINTENDED)
ADVERTISING EFFECTS AMONG ADOLESCENTS.
Wetenschappelijk artikel
aantal woorden: 9923
ANISSA BAUWENS
MASTERPROEF COMMUNICATIEWETENSCHAPPEN
afstudeerrichting COMMUNICATIEMANAGEMENT
PROMOTOR: DR. LISELOT HUDDERS
COMMISSARIS: CHRIS WIERSMA
ACADEMIEJAAR 2012 – 2013
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Table of Contents
Abstract
5
1. Introduction
6
2. Theoretical Background and Hypothesis Development
8
2.1 The Attractiveness of a Youth Market
8
2.2 Persuasion Processes
8
2.3 The concept & role of Advertising Literacy
9
2.4 Media Literacy Interventions
11
2.5 Why focus on Twelve-to Sixteen-Year-Old Children
11
2.6 Advertising Literacy in the New Media
12
2.6.1
The Integrated Product Placement
12
2.6.2
The Lure of the Advergame
13
2.7 Young People’s Processing of Contemporary Persuasive Messages
14
2.8 Attitudinal Defenses
14
2.9 Undesired Advertising Effects
15
2.9.1
Purchase Requests
15
2.9.2
Cultivation of Materialistic Attitudes
16
2.9.3
Insecurity about the Self
17
3. Method
18
3.1 Design, Stimuli and Procedure
18
3.2 Participants
20
3.3 Measures
20
4. Results
24
4.1 Control for External Events
24
4.2 Cognitive Defenses
24
4.2.1
Brand Recognition and Recall (H1a,b)
24
4.2.2
Persuasion Knowledge (H1c)
24
4.3 Attitudinal Defenses
25
4.3.1
Level of Scepticism (H2a)
25
4.3.2
Mediating Role of Persuasion Knowledge (H2b)
26
4.4 Unintended Advertising effects
26
3
4.4.1
Purchase Requests
26
4.4.2
Materialism
27
4.4.3
Self-Esteem
27
5. Discussion
29
6. Limitations and Further Research
31
7. References
32
8. Appendices (CD-ROM)
List of figures and Tables
Figure 1: Advergame Format
18
Figure 2: Product Placement Format
18
Figure 3: The PowerPoint Presentation
19
Figure 4: Persuasion Knowledge
25
Figure 5: Interaction Effect of Intervention and Stimulus on Scepticism
26
Figure 6: Attitude toward Commercials
27
Figure 7: Materialism
28
Table 1: Factorial Design
18
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Abstract
Met de opkomst van nieuwe, geavanceerde reclameformats is ook de publieke en academische
interesse, op het gebied van reclame gericht op jongeren, terug aangewakkerd. Academici vrezen
immers dat hedendaagse reclametechnieken, omwille van hun sterk geïntegreerde en interactieve
karakter, kinderen en jongeren voor nog grotere uitdagingen zullen stellen voor wat betreft hun
reclamewijsheid. Onderzoek heeft daarbij uitgewezen dat indien men onvoldoende over deze
wijsheid beschikt, men veel vatbaarder is voor ongewenste reclame-effecten zoals materialistische
attitudes, aanhoudende aankoopverzoeken en zich ongelukkig voelen. Met behulp van mediaeducatie pakketten, probeert men dan ook om kinderen kritisch te leren nadenken over reclame in
de context van hun dagelijkse leven. De doeltreffendheid van deze reclamewijsheid-interventies
werd echter nog niet bewezen. Bovendien hebben deze interventies nog maar zelden nieuwe
reclamevormen zoals advergames en product placements in het lessenpakket geïntegreerd.
Bijgevolg probeert deze studie dan ook deze lacunes op te vullen, door de effectiviteit van een
mediageletterdheid training op de reclamegevoeligheid van adolescenten uit te testen in de
context van nieuwe reclametechnieken. Uitgaand van een exploratief onderzoeksopzet met 214
deelnemers (11-16 jaar), laten onze resultaten zien dat zo’n training met succes de mediawijsheid
van jongeren stimuleert op het gebied van reclameherkenning, reclameherinnering en
overtuigingskennis. Daarnaast tonen de resultaten echter ook aan dat zo’n mediageletterdheid
training er echter niet in slaagt om jongeren op een kritische en weldoordachte wijze te laten
omgaan met interactieve en geïntegreerde reclamevormen. Jongeren blijven deze reclamevormen
zeer vermakelijk en aanlokkelijk vinden, wat dan ook resulteert in hoge aankoopintenties en zeer
positieve merkattitudes. Tot slot tonen de resultaten ook aan dat ongewenste reclame-effecten
zoals materialisme en een zeer laag zelfbeeld minder courant voorkomen in deze studie.
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1. Introduction
Compared to earlier generations, today’s youth grows up in a society which is steeped with
sophisticated advertising messages, promotional offers and creative appeals (Moore, 2004). Due to
the pervasiveness and omnipresence of such an evolving media culture, advertisers sometimes
make us forget how complex commercial methods can be. Contemporary advertising techniques
are nonetheless far from convenient, as their integrated and interactive nature makes them quite
difficult to recognize and comprehend. Especially when targeted to young consumers, these new
advertising forms evoke a lot of concern (Cauberghe, 2012). To this end, young people’s
susceptibility towards advertising and whether or not it is ethical to target advertising to them, has
long been the subject of both social and policy debates (Kunkel et al., 2004). A substantial amount
of research about the perceived threats from young people’s exposure to advertising has not only
intensified the debate, but also the attention devoted to the protection of this vulnerable audience.
With this, the concept of media literacy has been put back on top of the agenda.
In addressing the fairness of advertising aimed at young people, two lines of empirical research
prevail: while one strand focuses on children’s responses to advertising, the other concentrates on
its possible adverse effects. There is however also an accumulating body of research investigating
how parents, teachers, or others involved in the daily care of children can stimulate a reduced
advertising susceptibility (see Boush, 2001, for a review). In these studies, media literacy
interventions or mediations have shown promise in agitating positive effects on outcomes including
media knowledge, criticism, attitudes and behaviours (Jeong, Cho & Hwang, 2012). Lamentably,
however, the amount of research exploring the impact of a media literacy intervention on
unintended advertising effects is scarce. Researchers often seem to conduct a study on the efficacy
of media literacy training because it is a subtopic within their dominant field of interest, such as
children’s nutritional well-being (e.g. Mallinckrodt & Mizerski, 2007) alcohol and tobacco use (e.g.
Pinkleton et al., 2007; Austin & Johnson, 1997) and violence (e.g. Cantor & Wilson, 2003).
Moreover, their outcomes are merely based on traditional advertising formats, in spite of current
sophisticated advertising and marketing communications techniques.
Therefore the purpose of this study is to contribute to previous media literacy research by
investigating the effectiveness of a one-shot media literacy intervention on (unintended)
advertising effects in the context of new advertising practices. The central research question of this
dissertation is thus:
What is the impact of an advertising literacy mediation on materialistic attitudes, purchase
requests and the level of self-esteem among Flemish teenagers between 11 and 16 years
old?
Two different advertising formats, namely an advergame and branded music video placement, are
used to examine the proposed research question. The thesis starts with a theoretical review and
associated hypothesis development, in which a general framework is included that sheds light on
the concepts of advertising literacy, cognitive defense view, media literacy training and new
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advertising techniques. Subsequently the methodology and results of the investigation are
described. Finally, conclusions of the study are discussed as well as some limitations and guidelines
for further research.
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2. Theoretical Background and Hypothesis Development
2.1 The Attractiveness of a Youth Market
Potentially, children constitute the most lucrative market there is. Especially during the past decade
and a half, marketers’ interest in children and adolescents, as well as expenditure devoted to
targeting them, has expanded remarkably (Valkenburg, 2000). The reason why young people are
more and more considered as a significant group of consumers is three-fold: first, their buying
power for personal purchases has increased exponentially over time, they represent the future
market (adolescence is the life stage during which brand preferences are formed, alias brand
loyalty) and their say in the purchase decisions of their parents also has augmented tremendously
(Nelson & Mcleod, 2005; Valkenburg & Cantor, 2001; Arnett, 2007). Although the commercial world
hereby offers them important opportunities in terms of entertainment, knowledge and cultural
experience (Rozendaal et al., 2011), there is a negative side note to it. What tends to be overlooked
by these marketers, is that young people are assumed to be uniquely susceptible to advertising and
its associated effects. Though no real harm has been seen in the latter’s manifest intent of
increasing brand awareness, brand attitudes and purchase intentions (i.e. intended advertising
effects), the issue of immediate concern is rather the potentially harmful impact of advertising. As
Buijzen (2007) has observed, other, usually unintended effects can also occur when these young
consumers are exposed to advertising messages. Especially materialistic attitudes and increased
purchase requests are consequences enhanced by marketing tactics. Advertising is also positively,
though indirectly (mediated by advertising-induced purchase requests), related to life
dissatisfaction (Buijzen & Valkenburg, 2003a).
Researchers have attributed the issue surrounding young people’s immersion in this pervasive
commercial environment to the latter’s cognitive and social immaturity. Most authors agree that,
compared to adults, young consumers are less able to activate a critical processing of commercial
messages, and therefore, are more vulnerable to their persuasive influence (Kunkel et al., 2004;
Rozendaal, 2011). This, in turn, might leave them particularly more prone to a variety of (harmful)
advertising effects. Embedded within this topic, is the assumption that children’s and adolescents’
conceptual knowledge about advertising and ways of coping with its persuasive tactics, has yet to
be fully developed. To be able to explain how an intervention on this conceptual knowledge can
lead to a reduced susceptibility, it might be fruitful to first review the literature on young people’s
developmental knowledge structures.
2.2 Persuasion Processes
In academic research, it is believed that the extent to which an individual is vulnerable to
persuasive influences, has a lot to do with the age at which youngsters acquire an acceptable
degree of ‘persuasion knowledge’. Friestad and Wright (1994, p.3) described a consumer’s
persuasion knowledge as a resource that enables them “to recognize, analyse, interpret, evaluate
and remember persuasion attempts and to select and execute coping tactics believed to be effective
and appropriate”. They proposed that, over time, consumers develop perceptions of persuasion
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tactics and, in doing so, become better able to adapt and respond to such attempts. This
accumulated persuasion knowledge will then, in the words of Friestad and Wright (1994, p.10),
“hover in readiness” until needed to help form valid attitudes about an influence agent or product.
The basic idea of Friestad and Wright’s model (1994) is thus that a consumer is able to use his/her
persuasion knowledge to identify that an agent is trying to influence him/her, and to try to cope
effectively with the persuasion attempt. Though some authors (Friestad and Wright, 1994) believe
that people improve and refine their persuasion knowledge continually over their life span, this
coping capacity is, as Moore (2004, p.162) has noted, commonly regarded as a ‘developmental
milestone’.
Friestad & Wright’s theory (1994) furthermore suggests that individuals develop knowledge about
persuasive (advertising) techniques through cognitive maturation and relevant social experience. In
literature, it is generally assumed that these socio-cognitive capacities are acquired during
childhood and gradually develop up to an adult level. In this respect, persuasion expertise thus
tends to increase with age. The theoretical underpinnings of this finding stem from the field of
developmental cognitive psychology, were researchers have proposed several age-staged models
that classify children’s and adolescents’ emerging knowledge structures (Piaget, 1960; Roedder,
1981; John, 1999; Moses & Baldwin, 2005). The most historically influential model concerning
cognitive development, is Piaget’s (1960) constructivist theory of knowing. His ideas provide a
blueprint of childhood development in which the child’s mental and cognitive capacities progress in
a linear way through a set of biologically predetermined stages (Nairn & Fine, 2008). Every stage
consists of an expected age span in which children gradually come to acquire, construct, and use
particular cognitive concepts. Over the past several years other approaches from cognitive
psychology, such as the information processing model (Roedder, 1981) and consumer socialisation
research (John, 1999), have supported this developmentalist perspective. Only recently, some
limitations of these theories have been noted. Unlike its predecessors, Moses and Baldwin’s (2005)
“theories-of-mind” approach found that the criterion of determining at what age the first
glimmerings of a concept begin to emerge, might not be that appropriate in the current media
environment. As the relationship between the theory of Persuasion knowledge (Friestad & Wright,
1994) and cognitive development approaches has been used to explain children’s gradual
acquisition of ‘advertising literacy’ (Cauberghe et al., 2012), this finding might pose some changes.
2.3 The Concept & Role of Advertising Literacy
Navigating through the endless stream of literature on advertising literacy, it appears that finding a
comprehensive definition for this concept is no sinecure. Several authors define advertising literacy,
also called ‘media literacy’ in general terms, as the personal knowledge of a consumer regarding
the understanding of advertising, its persuasive nature and purpose as well as the comprehension
of strategies and tactics used to achieve marketers’ goals (Friestad & Wright, 1994; John, 1999;
Kunkel et al., 2004; Livingstone & Helsper, 2006). As the field of advertising literacy is highly
dynamic, a plethora of studies on the relationship between children’s age and their developing
advertising literacy has already been established. Based on the above-mentioned cognitive and
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consumer development studies (Piaget, 1960; John, 1999; Valkenburg & Cantor, 2001), as well as
on theories that address the social (Selman, 1980) and personal development (Shaffer and Kipp,
2007), a fourfold age classification system has been composed. Within each phase, children
accumulate more complex and abstract types of consumer- and advertising related components
(i.e. advertising recognition, comprehension of the selling intent & understanding of the persuasive
purpose of advertising) until they reach the ‘magical age’ of being advertising literate (Buijzen et al.,
2010).
In research, advertising literacy has thus been seen as a knowledge or skill that develops over the
years (Cauberghe et al., 2012, p. 106). Once armed with knowledge about advertising’s selling and
persuasive intent, it has been cited that consumers become more suspicious of marketer’s ulterior
motives and are thus better able to resist the underlying sales intent. This vision, known as the
‘cognitive defense view’, likewise assumes that advertising literacy can serve as a defencemechanism that reduces children’s and youngsters’ susceptibility towards advertising (Gunter,
Oates & Blades, 2005; Knowles & Linn, 2004). More specifically, advertising-related knowledge has
been compared to a sort of filter/radar, which is prompted as soon as people become aware of the
purpose of advertising (Rozendaal, Buijzen & Valkenburg, 2009; Cauberghe et al., 2012). This
activated literacy furthermore enables them to generate critical thoughts and counterarguments in opposition to the persuasive arguments - or will even make them ignore advertising. In this way,
a neutralization of the persuasion attempt can thus occur and, as a result, might have a negative
impact on the effectiveness of advertising (Kelly, Kerr & Drennan, 2010; Livingstone & Helsper,
2006).
The cognitive defense view also broadly implies that, without an understanding of advertising’s
persuasive intent, young consumers will not be able to evoke some level of scepticism about the
truthfulness of advertising claims (which will ultimately result in a greater vulnerability towards
adverse advertising effects). That is why the age at which children obtain this advertising-related
component, is assumed to represent a vital benchmark in the advertising literacy evolution. The
knowledge of persuasion intent implies that young people should be aware that advertisers
attempt to influence their purchase behaviour by changing their attitudes and cognitions about the
advertised product (Rozendaal, Buijzen & Valkenburg, 2011). Moreover, they need to understand
the specific ways and tactics in which advertisers try to persuade them (John, 1999; Kunkel et al.
2004). In cognitive developmental terms, this means that a child must be able to put himself in the
advertiser’s perspective and reflect on an abstract level (Cauberghe et al., 2012). However, as
abstract reasoning is attained no earlier than the age of 11 (Piaget, 1960), this consequently implies
that, until that age, no basic understanding of the persuasive intent will be developed. Research by
Rozendaal et al. (2010) supports this notion by claiming that only around the age of 12, youngsters
will develop a detailed comprehension of the persuasive intent of commercial messages. In
literature, it is therefore widely assumed that children at the age of twelve and above have
developed a mature level of the understanding of the selling and persuasive intent of advertising
(Gunter & Furnham, 1998). As a result, advertising to those too young to recognize persuasive
intent has been seen as inherently unfair (Kunkel et al., 2004).
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It is however important to note that some authors (e.g., Moses & Baldwin, 2005) downplay the
vision of advertising literacy as a cognitive defense-mechanism. Insights from their research
suggests that even if children have the necessary advertising knowledge in place, it does not
necessarily follow that they actually retrieve and apply it as a critical defense (Rozendaal et al.,
2011). Spontaneously retrieving and applying advertising-related knowledge is a skill that requires
the information-processing capacity (including cognitive skills such as executive functioning ones)
and is assumed to have an enormous impact on young people’s ability to process, cope with, and
defend against advertising (John, 1999; Moses & Baldwin, 2005). According to John (1999), this
unprompted application only occurs around the age of 121.
2.4 Media Literacy Interventions
It seems thus that age offers a publicly acceptable policy tool for intervening in the promotion of
messages targeted at young consumers (Samson, 2005). One of the ways in which this is done, is
encouraging the advertising literacy of the at-risk population (i.e., children under the age of twelve)
through interventions such as school-based advertising literacy programs (Eagle, 2007; Rozendaal
et al., 2011). Media literacy interventions thus refer to “education programs designed to reduce
harmful effects of the media by informing the audience about one or more aspects of the media,
thereby influencing media-related beliefs and attitudes, and ultimately preventing risky behaviours”
(Jeong, Cho & Hwang, 2012, p. 454). Especially Western countries, such as the United Kingdom and
the Netherlands, provide considerable amounts of state subsidy for the development of such
programs (e.g., Media Smart; Media Rakkers), assuming that these will empower children to
become critical and skilled consumers (Rozendaal, 2011, p. 8).
2.5 Why focus on Twelve- to Sixteen-Year-Old Children
The age classification system of media literacy and its associated age barriers, however, requires a
critical approach. Although the majority of the twelve-year-olds can see through the selling and
persuasive intent of advertising, empirical research has revealed that they still have not reached an
‘adult’ level of this competence (Cauberghe et al., 2012; Rozendaal, Buijzen & Valkenburg, 2008). In
this, Moses and Baldwin (2005, p.197) note that “merely having the [advertising] concepts in some
latent form does little if anything to prevent children from being led astray by advertising.”
Moreover, academic research has failed to keep pace with recent changes in young people’s media
environment (Buijzen et al., 2010, p. 428). Much discussion of advertising literacy in the literature is
limited to advertising in traditional media rather than encompassing the wide range of new and
evolving advertising formats to which today’s youth may be potentially exposed (Banerjee & Kubey,
2013). Along these lines, a recent study conducted by Cauberghe et al. (2012) has indicated that
even youngsters of the first and second degree (i.e., between the age of 13 and 16) score relatively
low to moderate concerning advertising-related knowledge. As apparent from the research results,
1
We hereby assume that the participants from our research are able to spontaneously retrieve this knowledge when
confronted with advertising and thus apply it as a critical defense.
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this might be due to the fact that these new forms of advertising are fundamentally different from
traditional forms (c.f. infra). Based on these insights, we therefore have opted to perform a media
literacy intervention among this age group.
As the advertising literacy intervention approach has shown promise in successfully increasing
advertising literacy in the context of traditional advertising formats (Hobbs & Frost, 2003; Chernin,
2007), it seems logical that an advertising literacy intervention addressing new advertising formats
such as product placements and advergames, could also prove useful in making adolescents
between the age of 12 and 16 more media-literate. Previous findings thus inspired us to investigate
the following hypothesis:
H1: Following exposure to media literacy training, cognitive defenses such as the (a)
recognition of advertising, (b) brand recall and (c) persuasion knowledge will increase.
Empirical research of Wollslager (2009) already showed that an advertising literacy class can have a
positive significant impact on recognizing the commercial nature of advergames.
2.6 Advertising Literacy in the New Media
It is indeed no exaggeration to state that, over time, the commercial media environment young
consumers are confronted with, has changed a lot. As Bailey’s review (2011, p.54) has observed,
“[young people] are living increasingly ‘media-saturated’ lives, inevitably being exposed to an
increasing volume of advertising and marketing as they watch television, go online, use mobile
phones and smart phones, or play video games.” In order to break through this ad clutter,
advertisers targeting the youth market have rapidly adopted new, sophisticated advertising formats
(Calvert, 2008; Moore, 2004). Studies investigating non-traditional forms of advertising have
observed that the two key characteristics of such new practices are the level of integration
between the persuasive message and its context and interactivity (Cauberghe et al., 2012; Buijzen,
Van Reijmersdal & Owen, 2010). As we addressed advergaming and product placement as a part of
the media literacy training in this study, we will explain each of the defining characteristics on the
basis of these particular advertising formats.
2.6.1 The Integrated Product Placement
In this new advertising landscape, ‘product placement’ represents one of the biggest stumbling
blocks towards youngsters’ advertising-related knowledge. Product placement, also called brand
placement, is a hybrid form of advertising in which the commercial message and media content
intertwine (Cauberghe et al., 2012). Balasubramanian, Karrh & Patwardhan (2006, p.115) define
product placement furthermore as “the paid inclusion of branded products or brand identifiers
through audio and/or visual means within mass media programs.” Especially the phenomenon of
paid product placement in music video formats is a trend that is increasing (Chang, 2003; Plambeck,
2010, July 5). Given that 12- to 15-year-olds watch music videos on an average of 4.3 days per week
(Kaestle, Halpern and Brown, 2007), this need not be a surprise.
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The reasoning that drives product placement’s popularity as a marketing strategy, is that this type
of new advertising format is believed to be more powerful than traditional advertisements because
it is not perceived as a form of persuasive message (Fitch, 2009; Livingstone, 2009). In product
placement, the involved audience gets exposed to the brands and products in the natural
environment of a movie, program (Panda, 2004; Cebrzynski, 2006) or – as in our study – music
video. That is, the persuasive, commercial message is in fact highly integrated into the context,
making its persuasive character less noticeable. Researchers have claimed that the unobtrusiveness
of such placements therefore undermines the recognition of advertising and its persuasive
influence, in particular among children and adolescents (Mallinckrodt & Mizerski, 2007; Owen et
al., 2010). To this end, young consumers are relatively unaware of this new trend (Droeven, 2012,
December 12) and thus unprepared to deal with the unexpected inclusion of branded messages in
their viewing material. Additionally, because of the fact that the advertisement is presented in an
entertaining context, product placement is unlikely to activate the use of consumers’ cognitive
defense mechanism that would sour them against the veiled influence of the placed brand (Moses
& Baldwin, 2005; Nairn & Fine, 2008). Therefore brand placements in media content are said to
lead to an increased brand impact in terms of brand knowledge (Lee & Faber, 2007; Russell, 2002)
and brand attitudes (Law & Braun, 2000; Russell, 2002). Moreover, a study of Auty and Lewis (2004)
revealed that older children appear to be equally sensitive to the impact of product placement as
younger children.
2.6.2 The Lure of the Advergame
In addition to integration, new forms of advertising are often characterized by the interactivity that
is contained in the advertisement. This interactive aspect ensures that the user can actively start
‘coping’ with the content and that, in doing so, interaction occurs with the brand/product. This
active exposure furthermore ensures that the message is receiving more attention and, in doing so,
will be well remembered (Mallinckrodt & Mizerski, 2007; Cauberghe et al., 2012). So due to the
interactive aspect, intense brand experience will occur. An example of such an interactive
advertisement format is the advergame. Advergames look like simple, normal games, but are
actually specifically made to advertise a product or brand. Buijzen, Van Reijmersdal and Owen
(2010, p.428) define them as “advertiser-sponsered online games in which the product or brand
logo is an essential game component”. Hence, advergaming incorporates branding directly into the
gaming environment, enticing young people to play in embedded advertising environments
(Edwards, 2003; Moore, 2006). As gaming is one of the favourite ways of youngsters to spend their
free time (Rideout, Foehr & Roberts, 2010), such branded environments are consequently very
interesting and appealing. Playing a game is also seen as a very pleasant experience, often
accompanied by a player’s ‘plunge’ into the virtual environment (Calleja, 2007). This feeling of
immersion and involvement with the game motivates people to continue playing and makes them
lose track of time (Jennett et al., 2008), resulting in a relatively long interaction time. The
interactive format of advergames thus not only generates a bigger brand involvement, but also
results in a pleasant experience. This may, in turn, create a greater openness to the brand message
(Moore & Rideout, 2007). This is also confirmed by recent research that has shown that the attitude
13
towards a game has a positive effect on the attitude towards the brand that was placed in the
interactive game (Mau, Kehrers & Silberer, 2006; Cauberghe & De Pelsmacker, 2011).
2.7 Young People’s Processing of Contemporary Persuasive Messages
Recent insights on young people’s advertising processing have argued that, due to the highly
integrated and interactive nature of contemporary advertising, young people primarily process
contemporary advertising in a different way (Rozendaal et al., 2011). To investigate the underlying
mechanisms of the persuasion processes of new media, the PCMC model (in full, the Processing of
new Commercialized Media Content model) of Buijzen, Van Rejimersdal and Owen (2010) might
come in handy. The model distinguishes three levels in which persuasion can be processed: a
systematic, heuristic and automatic one. All three are characterized by varying levels of ‘cognitive
elaboration’, which relates to “the recipient’s level of attention to and awareness of the message
and to their motivation and ability to process the message effortful” (Buijzen et al., 2010, p. 430).
Both the heuristic and automatic route are seen as processes under conditions of low elaboration.
According to the model, not only the cognitive development of the recipient is important, but also
the amount of cognitive capacity that the message or context requires (resources required, RR)
should be taken into account, as well as the cognitive capacity that the receiver is prepared to
devote to it (resources allocated, RA) (Cauberghe et al., 2012). Applied to our study, this means
that, because the youngsters’ cognitive capacity (both RR & RA) is engaged elsewhere (playing a
game or watching a music video), researchers think that there is not enough ‘remaining resource’
available for them to stop and think about the purpose of the game/video clip or to engage in any
scepticism about the source of the message (Nairn & Hang, 2012). Consequently, they will process
the persuasive message on a low elaborate level (i.e., following the heuristic or automatic route),
which means that they may process the brand without consciously being aware of it, resulting in
non-critical attitudes. The limited capacity approach (Lang et al., 2006) follows this line of reasoning
by stating that in the commercial media environment of today, the processing of the persuasive
message is merely a secondary task in youngsters information processing. They will be tempted to
primarily process the highly appealing context (game/video clip) of the advertisement and,
subsequently, with what is left of their cognitive resources, the persuasive message. The latter will
however be done faster and on a less profound level, making adolescents more susceptible to
commercial effects (Lee et al., 2009; van Reijmersdal et al., 2010). As such, researchers believe that
modern advertising formats actually distract youngsters from using their relevant advertising
knowledge as a critical defense (Buijzen et al., 2010; Moore & Rideout, 2007; Nairn & Fine, 2008;
Owen, Lewis, Auty & Buijzen, 2009).
2.8 Attitudinal Defenses
Assuming that youngsters thus primarily process new advertising techniques on a less elaborate
level, Rozendaal et al. (2010) suggest that young consumers might need low-effort, attitudinal
defenses next to cognitive ones. According to them, a general critical attitude toward advertising defined by Lutz (1985) as the tendency to respond in a consistently less favourable way to
advertising in general - might be more successful in altering young people’s responses to
14
advertising. More specifically, such attitudes to advertising may be especially significant because
they influence the attitude toward commercials, an important antecedent of the brand attitude
(Moore & Lutz, 2000), as well as their requests for the advertised products (Phelps & Hoy, 1996).
Moreover, several studies in the past (Lutz, 1985; Zuwerink & Devine, 1996) have shown that
general critical attitudes toward advertising (such as scepticism and disliking of advertising)
automatically generate negative affect when processing a specific advertisement (i.e. affect
transfer). So, even when young consumers are not motivated or able to process an advertising
message elaborately, strengthening participant’s emotionally based resistance might be successful
in reducing their susceptibility (Rozendaal, Buijzen, & Valkenburg, 2010).
In line with the advice of Rozendaal et al. (2011) to reformulate the focus of advertising
interventions, our media literacy intervention has focused on installing less favourable and sceptical
attitudes2 toward advertising by means of a classical discussion about youngster’s general (dis)liking
of advertising. Additionally, as noted by Boush, Friestad and Rose (1994), scepticism toward
advertising is said to increase when audiences acquire a more refined knowledge of advertisers’
tactics and persuasive intent. Therefore, the following hypothesis was formulated:
H2: The effect of a sceptical attitude on brand attitude is mediated by the level of persuasion
knowledge: participants who have received the media literacy training will exhibit an increased
level of scepticism (H2a) that, in turn, will decrease the attitude towards the brand (H2b).
2.9 Undesired Advertising Effects
As we mentioned earlier, increased expenses on advertisements targeting young people have been
paralleled by rising concerns about potential harmful side effects (Kunkel et al., 2004; Moore, 2004;
Young, 2003). In the next paragraphs, we will explain how these effects arise.
2.9.1 Purchase Requests
Advertising-induced buying requests are one of the main reasons why marketers point their
attention to young people as a target market. It has been suggested that even a single exposure to
a promotion can directly influence young people’s preferences for products (Goldberg, Gorn, &
Gibson 1978; Resnik & Stern 1977), which in turn will effect product requests. Marketers hold
youngsters’ product preferences in high esteem, as the latter significantly affect the buying
patterns of the family (Valkenburg & Cantor, 2001). After all, approximately one-third of children’s
influence attempts result in product purchase. Moreover, the actual purchase influence increases
with age as young people develop more effective ways (such as bargaining, begging or opinionates)
to approach and respond to their parents (Valkenburg, 2000, pp.53-65). However, not every
purchase request will lead to permission of actually buying the product (Calvert, 2008) which, in
2
By extending the theoretical conception of advertising literacy by this dimension, it becomes more in line with the
original definition of media literacy (i.e. “the ability to access, analyse, evaluate, create messages across a variety of
contexts”, Christ & Potter, 1998, p.7). This explains why we have called our intervention a media literacy intervention.
15
turn, may cause parent-child conflicts or negative feelings such as anger, disappointment or
sadness (Buijzen & Valkenburg, 2003).
In general, children’s liking of commercials has been seen as an important predictor of their
intention to ask for the advertised products (Phelps & Hoy, 1996). This liking of commercials has
been shown to be negatively affected by a child’s knowledge and skills to counter a persuasive
message (Feshbach, Feshbach & Cohen, 1982). Based on these findings, we hypothesized that:
H3: The level of persuasion knowledge will have a mediating influence on the relationship
between the liking of commercials and their advertising-induced purchase requests.
2.9.2 Cultivation of Materialistic Attitudes
Although previous research has concentrated on children in particular, exposure to advertising is
also likely to arouse adolescents’ desires for material possessions (Chia, 2010). Since most
advertisement ideology portrays material possessions as important objectives and vigorously
associates desirable life qualities – such as beauty, success and happiness – with material
belongings (Wulfemeyer & Muller, 1992), materialistic values were found to be associated with
young people’s exposure to (television) advertising (Buijzen & Valkenburg, 2003). Therefore it has
been said that advertising actually encourages materialism because it “concentrates on what we
have, not who we are” (Sirgy et al., 2012, p. 80). However, materialism is not always per se entirely
negative or socially undesirable (Chia, 2010). For example, Csikszentmihalyi and Rochberg-Halton
(1981) state that when items act as essential means for discovering and fostering personal values
and goals of life, materialism is potentially harmless (i.e. labeled instrumental materialism). Only
when consumption furthers no goal beyond possession itself, as noted by Chia (2010, p. 402), then
does materialism become dangerous (i.e. labeled terminal materialism). Nonetheless, for children
and adolescents – who are still in their formative years in terms of developing identity and values
(Cramer, 2001; Goldberg et al., 2003) – it is a phenomenon that deserves attention from
researches and educators.
Previous studies (e.g., Moschis & Moore, 1982; Greenberg & Brand, 1993) have confirmed that
adolescents’ (television) advertising exposure has a causal effect on their cultivation of materialism.
These cultivation effects are most likely to appear when information is processed with few to little
cognitive efforts (Shrum, 2001, 2004). If we link this with what has been said before about the
processing of new advertising techniques, this suggests that there is at least a similar, if not a
stronger, possibility of the presence of materialism after exposure to new advertising techniques.
Nonetheless, as we have constructed a media literacy intervention that tries to avoid the
processing on a low elaborate level, we hypothesized that:
H4: Compared with the control groups, youngsters exposed to the media literacy intervention
will show less materialistic attitudes.
16
2.9.3 Insecurity about the Self
It has been stated that feelings of self-worth and a belief in one’s own abilities are negatively
related to persuasibility. That is, “those who are low in self-esteem lack the self-confidence to rely
on their own beliefs and judgment and therefore fall back on the judgment of others” (Boush,
Friestad & Rose, 1994, p.167). In the case of advertising, young people might thus be persuaded to
fall back on the judgement of marketers, leaving them particularly vulnerable toward advertising’s
effectiveness. Moreover, adolescents’ low self-esteem may lead them to rely on consumption
symbols for self-expression and self-worth which, in turn, is likely to manifest in a greater extent of
materialism (Pechmann et al., 2005). Especially the period of early adolescence has been associated
with declines in self-esteem, which reaches rock bottom between the ages of 12 and 13
(Rosenberg, 1989). However, within this field, the study of Boush, Friestad and Rose (1994)
confirmed that a tendency to doubt advertising claims (i.e. ad scepticism), “reflects the selfconfidence to challenge advertisers' persuasive attempts rather than to believe whatever is
presented”. Since ad scepticism - which increases when a more sophisticated advertising knowledge
is attained (Boush, Friestad & Rose, 1994) - is thus positively related to self-esteem, we formulated
the following mediating hypothesis:
H5: The level of persuasion knowledge will have a mediating influence on the relationship between
ad scepticism and self-esteem.
17
3. Method
3.1 Design, Stimuli and Procedure
To test the impact of a media literacy training on the (unintended) effects of advertising, this study
carried out a 2 (media literacy intervention: lesson or no lesson) x 2 (stimulus: product placement
or advergame) between-subjects factorial design.
Type of intervention
Type of stimulus
Advergame
Advergame
No lesson (N= 49)
Lesson (N= 52)
Product placement
Product placement
No lesson (N= 56)
Lesson (N= 57)
Table 1 : factorial design
The stimulus materials for this experiment were an existing branded music video and advergame.
The music video selected was called “Part of me” by Katy Perry, a very popular American pop artist.
The selection of this video was based on the appearance of one single brand (Ice-Watch) within the
music video. The advergame used was called “Ice-Game”, and resided on the Ice-Watch Facebook
page. This advergame was selected because of several reasons. It incorporated the Ice-Watch logo
and trademark several times, participants required minimal skills to complete the task and the aim
of the game was to ultimately score the highest points and win an Ice-Watch. Moreover, as these
specific stimuli are both intruded with the same popular brand, the comparison between the
advergame and product placement condition will seem more plausible. We also intentionally
selected the Ice-watch brand, as its products are aimed at a youthful audience of buyers and the
product category itself (watches) is relevant and appealing to our sample. The trendy brand has
furthermore made worldwide headlines with chic, plastic watches in all colours of the rainbow and
is thus most certainly known by the majority of youngsters.
Figure 1: advergame format
Figure 2: product placement format
18
Important to note here is that the brand was placed much more prominently in the advergame
than in the music video. We will take this into account during the discussion of the results.
An experiment was conducted in which subjects were confronted with advanced marketing
methods such as product placement and advergaming after receiving a literacy training. To
establish internal validity, a control group was desirable for determining the outcomes without
training. Since this study was conducted in the field, the researcher assigned participant groups to
treatment or control conditions in a non-random but balanced manner. Among participant groups
assigned to a treatment or control condition, however, the researcher was able to randomly assign
groups to the advergame or product placement condition. The control group participants had to
watch either the branded music video (product placement) or play the advergame without
receiving any training. The others first participated in a 15-minute media literacy class in which a
brief PowerPoint presentation with screen shots of the explained marketing techniques was used
(see appendix 1). The purpose of the training was to establish a basic premise about advertising and
an elementary understanding of more advanced and integrated commercial content. As media
literacy interventions with active audience involvement are assumed to be more effective – they
elicit greater mental efforts and comprehension (Banerjee & Green, 2006) – an interactive lesson
(i.e., discussion) was prepared. Youngsters were also encouraged to ask key questions about the
media content they encountered. After this media literacy intervention, the participants had to
complete a buffer activity (i.e., word search) before being exposed to the product placement or
advergame. In the end, all participants had to fill out a written questionnaire.
Figure 3: the PowerPoint presentation
The experiment was managed by one female researcher and supervised by a teacher or educator
when she was in contact with the participants. Both survey and training were managed by the same
researcher in an attempt to create continuity throughout the sessions. In addition, the study was
administered in the school’s computer or multimedia labs dependent on which school was
19
accessed. Students were informed that they would be contributing to a research about advertising,
without revealing the purpose of the study.
Before a certain class entered the computer lab, the researcher made sure that all necessary
computers and documentation or presentation files were already initiated. This was especially
necessary in the case of the advergame procedure. In order to play the advergame, participants had
to have an account on the Facebook site, connect to the site’s address
http://www.facebook.com/ice.watch, and click on “Ice-Game” in the navigation menu. To avoid any
contact with other advertising messages, a fake Facebook account of the researcher was used to
log in and set up the game in advance. Moreover, the researcher ensured that the game was pretested on all computers. Each student had his/her own computer station to play on and prior to
start playing the game, instructions on the use and rules of the game were specified. For the
experiment relating to the product placement, a beamer was used to project the music video in
large. Similarly to the advergame setting, the video clip was pretested on YouTube to avoid pop-up
advertising. As research has shown that time plays an important role in the processing of
advertisements (de Goeij, 2006, p.9), the researcher made sure that in both settings the
participants were exposed to the advertising technique the same amount of time (i.e. 4 minutes, 12
seconds).
As for the survey, participants in all conditions had to complete the same sort of questions. There
were two types of questionnaires, each adapted to the applied kind of advertising format
(advergame or music video) (see appendix 2). The survey instrument contained 23 questions. All
questions were guided in class and if something was not clear, the youngsters could request
assistance to the researcher or teacher. Before the questionnaires were administered, the
experimenter had stressed the importance of completing the questionnaire independently and
emphasized that the test had nothing to do with formal grades or testing.
3.2 Participants
A total of 214 youngsters of 11 to 16 years old (M = 13.05; SD = .83) participated in the research by
completing a paper-and-pencil questionnaire. The final sample consisted of 112 (52,3%) girls and
102 (47,7%) boys, who were all in the first and second grade of middle school. The young people
were recruited from three secondary schools in different urban and suburban areas (Koninklijk
Atheneum in Deinze, Middenschool Groenhove in Waregem and Sint-Vincentiusinstituut in
Dendermonde). These schools were contacted by mail, telephone or on site. Prior to participating,
institutional and parental approval (see appendix 3) were obtained. Youngsters who hadn’t
obtained the parental approval, were advised not to fill out a questionnaire and were given
alternative assignments. Anonymity of the students was maintained throughout the study.
3.3 Measures
Following Panic et al. (in press), a relatively simple and less cognitively-demanding measurement
technique was used to assess youngsters’ perceptions. The latter were asked to choose from a
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number of predefined response options (cf. Rozendaal, Buijzen, & Valkenburg, 2012), of which each
option was presented using visual icons and pictures (cf. Mallinkrodt & Mizerski, 2007).
Attitude toward game/video clip. Enjoyment evoked by a game or video clip is assumed to be
consciously expressed by participants in the form of their attitude toward the game/video clip. To
examine how much the adolescents liked the material used in the experiment, a 5-point Likert-scale
was used (adopted from Mallinckrodt & Mizerski, 2007) (M= 3.89; SD= .81).
Brand recognition and recall. The potential of young people to distinguish media content and
advertising content from each other, is measured by asking young people if they had seen a brand
("Have you seen a brand in the [advertising format]" with the possible answers yes or no; M= .72;
SD= .45) and if they knew what brand it was (“If so, what brand have you seen”)? (Mallinckrodt &
Mizerski, 2007, p. 93; Cauberghe et al., 2012). Responses to the open-ended question were
processed as follows: Ice-watch was coded as 1, all other responses were coded as 0 (M= .85; SD=
.36).
Persuasion Knowledge. Following Cauberghe et al. (2012), the three main aspects of persuasion
knowledge were measured: understanding of the source, understanding of the persuasive intent &
comprehension of the selling intent. Understanding of the source was measured with the question
“Who has placed this brand in the [advertising format], you think?” with the following response
options: “the teacher”, “the researcher”, “the creators of the game”, “Ice-watch” or “I don’t know”.
Just as in the research of van Reijmersdal et al. (2012), bogus answers were provided in an attempt
to minimize yeah-saying effects. The fourth response was coded as 1 (correct) and the remaining
responses were coded as 0 (incorrect) (M= .60; SD= .49). Understanding of the persuasive intent
was measured in a similar way by asking the youngsters if they knew why an Ice-watch was shown
in the [advertising format]. Following response options were provided: “because I could play a fun
game”, “to make me like Ice-watch”, “because I would be happy” or “I don’t know” (van
Reijmersdal et al., 2012). The first response was coded as 1 (correct) and the remaining responses
were coded as 0 (incorrect) (M= .87; SD= .33). Additionally, for each advertising format, they were
asked whether the format tried to make them buy the product (i.e., selling intent: “Does this game
want you to buy an Ice-watch?”) Response options were 1 = yes, and 0= no. (M= .73; SD= .45)
(Rozendaal, 2011). A scale was constructed by calculating children’s total score over the three
questions (M= 2.2; SD= .82).
An additional manipulation check for persuasion knowledge was acquired from the study of Wei,
Fischer & Main (2008). By asking “Do you think Ice-watch has paid for occurring in the [advertising
format]?”, we wanted to control if the media literacy intervention in this experiment actually did
increase the persuasion knowledge among participants. Response categories for this question were
based on a 5-point scale ranging from certainly to certainly not (M= 4.37; SD= .82).
Attitude toward Commercials. The attitude of the youngster concerning the form of advertising
was measured by asking how much they liked such an [advertising format]. The scale was ranged
from 1 (not fun at all) to 5 (yes, great fun) with overall M= 3.94; SD= .89. Following Cauberghe et al.
21
(2012), this attitude may be interpreted as a possible benchmark for youngsters’ critical reflection
regarding such advertising formats.
Perceived appropriateness. We measured the youngsters perceived appropriateness (based on the
study of Wei, Fischer & Main, 2008) with one item: “Do you think brands may pay to be mentioned
in [advertising format]?” Responses were ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree)
(M= 3.97; SD= .96).
Brand preference. Subsequently, the youngster’s brand preference was measured by requesting
them to choose between several brands of watches. Participants could choose from five brands of
watches, all of which looked very similar. Possible responses included (1) Crown-watch, (2) Coloriwatch, (3) Swatch (4) Fossil and (5) Ice-watch (An & Stern, 2011).
Product involvement. Measures of product involvement assessed the degree to which participants
were interested in wearing a trendy watch, using a five-point Likert scale (Mallinckrodt & Mizerski
2007) (M= 3.63; SD= .96).
Brand attitude. Questions concerning the attitude towards Ice-watch assessed participant’s brand
attitude. For this, we used the brand attitude scale as shown in the study of Bakir and Palan (2010).
This particular scale consists of four items, relying on different scales from prior research (e.g.,
Moore & Lutz, 2000). Youngsters were asked to indicate how much they liked Ice-Watch (e.g. “Do
you like Ice-watches?”, “How many stars would you give to Ice-watch?”, “Do you think Ice-watch is
great?” and “Would you tell your friends about Ice-Watch”). Response categories were based on a
5-point Likert scale (α= .83; M= 3.51; SD= .76).
Intended Product Requests. To measure the persuasive impact of advertising, respondents were
asked to indicate whether they intended to ask their parents to purchase an Ice-Watch watch.
Contrary to the study of Mallinckrodt & Mizerski (2007), a 5-point Likert scale was used (M= 2.48;
SD= 1.17).
Materialism. Materialism was understood as a second-order construct with three underlying
factors: material centrality, material happiness and material success (Richins & Dawson, 1992). To
ascertain the adolescents’ level of materialism, the 3-item version of the MVS-C scale (α = .73) was
used (adapted from Opree et al., 2011) (M= .08; SD= .21).
Self-esteem (unhappiness). To examine the level of adolescents’ self-esteem, a self-constructed 6item scale was used (see appendix 4). Initially eight items were adapted with regard to youngsters’
global self-worth, based on the ‘Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale’ (RSE; Rosenberg, 1989) as well as on
the ‘Harter’s Self-Perception Profile for Adolescents scale’ (SPPA; Harter, 1988). Respondents had to
indicate to what extent they agreed with statements such as “I’m doing well at school”, “I have
many friends” and “I’m good at sports”, on a scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly
agree). To make correct interpretation of the self-esteem scores easier, one item (“At times I think
I’m no good at all”) was reversed. After performing a reliability analysis and associated principal
components analysis, two items (“sometimes I think there’s nothing I can” and “I've already had a
22
boyfriend/girlfriend”) were eventually omitted. A subsequent principal components analysis
showed that the remaining six items loaded on two components; three of them loaded on one
factor (EV= 2.58; R²= .43) and the others on a second factor (EV= 1.12; R²= .19). Yet we wanted to
create a cumulative score for self-esteem in order to make full use of the data. Hence, after
reliability analysis, mean scores for all six scale items were taken together to create a single
measure of the reported self-esteem (α=.72; M= 4.00; SD= .57).
Ad Scepticism. Ad scepticism was seen as a the tendency toward disbelief in advertising claims
(Obermiller & Spangenber, 1998) and, as such, participants responded to the following question
using a 5-point Likert scale with ‘really nice’ and ‘not nice at all’ as anchors: “What do you think of
advertising?” (M= 2.77; SD= .99).
Background characteristics. Youngster’s age (M= 13.05; SD= .83) and gender were also ascertained.
23
4. Results
All results of this experiment were entered and analysed using the statistical program SPSS 21
(Statistical Package for the Social Sciences).
4.1 Control for External Events
There were small but statistically significant differences between the experimental groups on some
background characteristics (age and gender, p < .05). To eliminate the effects of these background
variables, they were included in the analyses when they correlated significantly with the specific
dependent variable (see appendix 5)
As we have mentioned earlier, the brand in the advergame was placed much more prominently
than in the branded video clip. The results confirm this statement as, overall, 40,7% of the
participants who had watched the video clip, did not remember seeing a brand, compared to only
13,9 % of the participants in the advergame conditions (χ2= 19.05; df = 1; p < .00). Children did also
more accurately remember the Ice-watch brand in the advergame (61,8%) in comparison with
those in the product placement group (38,2%) (χ2= 29.38; df = 2; p < .00) (see appendix 6).
4.2 Cognitive Defenses
The first aim of our research was to investigate whether a media literacy training would increase
cognitive defenses such as the recognition of advertising, brand recall and persuasion knowledge
(H1). Due to the difference in brand prominence, a split file was conducted to compare the results
for both formats. Because of the binary nature of the scales, a χ2 statistic was used to test for
differences.
4.2.1 Brand Recognition and Recall (H1a,b)
Within the product placement group, significantly more children (64,2%) in the treatment group
had recognized a brand, compared with children (35,8%) in the control group (χ2= 12.42; df = 1, p <
.00). As for brand recall: of those who said they had seen a brand in the music video, 54,4 % of the
children in the treatment group filled in the right answer (Ice-Watch), opposed to 33,9 % of those in
the control group (χ2= 12.8; df = 2; p < .00). Within the advergaming group, no significant result
among the treatment and control group was observed towards brand recognition (p = .06) and
brand recall (p = .23) (see appendix 7).
4.2.2 Persuasion knowledge (H1c)
First of all, we performed an independent samples T-test on the persuasion knowledge
manipulation check item to examine the results of this question (see appendix 8). The outcomes
indicate that for both formats (Advergame, F (81.68) = 2.96; p <.00; t= -3.03) and product
placement F (111) = 19.20; p <.00; t= -3.86), there indeed was a significant difference in the answers
the children gave. With this, we can conclude that the activation of persuasion knowledge in the
children on the basis of the media literacy training was very effective.
24
Subsequently, a two-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) (see appendix 9) with the stimulus and type
of intervention as independent variables and persuasion knowledge as dependent variable,
revealed that there is a main effect of intervention (F(1) = 33.75; p = .00) on the level of persuasion
knowledge. Adolescents who received the intervention scored considerably higher (M= 2.50; SD=
.66) on their knowledge of persuasion than those who didn’t receive the literacy class (M= 1.90;
SD= .85) (see figure 4) Furthermore, no main effect of the stimulus (F(1) = 2.61; p= .11) and
significant interaction effect between stimulus and intervention (F(1)= 2.77; p= .10) was perceived.
These results support H1.
Figure 4: Persuasion knowledge
4.3 Attitudinal Defences
Our second research aim was to test if the level of scepticism had increased after exposure to a
media literacy intervention and if this was mediated by the level of persuasion knowledge (H2a,
H2b).
4.3.1 Level of Scepticism (H2a)
Besides increasing youngster’s cognitive defenses, we also aimed to increase their sceptical
attitudes by a discussion of their general attitude toward advertising in class. Moreover, several
times during the PowerPoint presentation, the researcher encouraged youngsters to be more
sceptical about new advertising practices. Unexpectedly, however, a two-way Analysis of Variance
(ANOVA) (see appendix 10a) indicated that there was no main effect of both stimulus (F(1) = .41; p
25
= .52) and the type of intervention (F(1) = .88; p =.77) on the level of scepticism. Moreover, the
results reveal that there is a significant interaction effect between the type of intervention and
stimulus (F (1) =5.75; p= .02, see figure 5).
Figure 5: interaction effect of type of intervention and stimulus on scepticism
Youngsters who received the media literacy intervention in the music video sample, tended to be
less sceptical (M = 2.91) than those who hadn’t received the intervention (M = 2.54). The opposite
was observed in the advergame sample (Mintervention= 2.67 vs. Mno intervention= 2.96). Consequently, we
wanted to know if this deviation was significant in the type of intervention among both formats.
Therefore, by means of a split file, a T-test was performed (see appendix 10b). In the situation of
the music video experiment, youngsters in the treatment group were significantly less sceptical (M=
2.91) than those in the control group (M= 2.55; F (97.4)= 18.28; p =.04; t= -2.09). As a result, we are
unable to accept the proposed hypothesis.
4.3.2 Mediating Role of Persuasion Knowledge (H2b)
To estimate the relationships among persuasion knowledge, ad scepticism and brand attitude, we
used multiple linear regression analyses (see appendix 11). To locate the existence of an
intervening variable, we knew from literature (Baron & Kenny, 1986) that at least four linear
regression analyses had to be carried out. We started by examining whether ad scepticism had a
statistic significant effect on brand attitude. Results of the regression analysis showed that this was
indeed the case (F(1) = 15.91 ; p <.00; β =.27). Next, another regression analysis was conducted to
see if there was any correlation between scepticism and persuasion knowledge. However, the
outcomes did not show a significant effect of persuasion knowledge on the level of scepticism (F(1)
= .00; p = .99; β= .00). From these results, we can conclude that there is no mediating effect of
persuasion knowledge.
26
4.4 Unintended advertising effects
4.4.1 Purchase requests (H3)
For hypothesis three we analysed the influence of persuasion knowledge on the relationship
between the attitude toward commercials and purchase requests. As with the previous research
question, multiple linear regression analyses were used to explore the mediation effect (see
appendix 12). Although a significant effect of the attitude towards commercials on the dependent
variable purchase requests was noted (F(1) = 19.52; p< .00; β= .29), no significant influence of
persuasion knowledge on the attitude toward commercials was perceived (F(1)= .59; p = .48; β= .05). As such, the results fail to support the proposed hypothesis. Further examination of the
attitude towards commercials (through 2-way Analysis of Variance) displayed a main effect of the
stimulus (F(1)= 27.50; p= .00). Participants of the study rated the branded video clip format
significantly higher (M= 4.23; SD= .08) than the advergame format (M= 3.63; SD=.08) (see figure 5).
The same was done for the product request variable, but no significant differences were found.
Figure 6: Attitude toward commercials
4.4.2 Materialism (H4)
To see whether the youngsters’ materialistic values had decreased after the media literacy
intervention, a two-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was run (see appendix 13). However, no
significant main (Type of intervention F(1)= 2.35; p=.13 vs. Stimulus F(1)=1.51; p=.22) or interactioneffects (F(1)= 2.06; p=.15) were found (see appendix 12). Adolescents who participated in the
media literacy class did not show a significantly lower level of materialism (M= .06; SD= .02) than
those who didn’t participate (M= .11; SD= .20) (see figure 6). The same was true for the type of
stimulus they received (Madvergame=.67; SDadvergame= .02 vs. Mplacement= .10; SDplacement=.02). In
27
addition, boys (M=.12; SD=.25) tended to be significantly more materialistic than girls (M=.05;
SD=.15) (with F= 19.84; p= .03; t= 2.26).
Figure 7: Materialism
4.4.3 Self-esteem (H5)
To test the research question for self-esteem, the same analysis was performed as in H2b and H3
(i.e., multiple regression analysis) (see appendix 14). The results showed that there was a significant
positive relation between self-esteem and ad scepticism (β = .17; p = .02), but no significant result
for persuasion knowledge and scepticism (β = .00) (F(1)= .00; p= .99). This means that participants
who score high on ad scepticism, will also score significantly high on self-esteem (r= .17; p= .01).
This cannot be said about persuasion knowledge and ad scepticism. Subsequently, these results do
not support H4. Further examination of the self-esteem and ad scepticism variable showed that
boys are significantly more self-confident (M= 4.09; SD=.57) and sceptical (M= 2.63; SD= 1.07), than
girls (Mself-esteem= 3.92; SDself-esteem=.57 vs. Mscepticism= 2.90; SDscepticism= .91).
28
5. Discussion & Conclusion
Until now, studies on the effectiveness of media literacy interventions – aimed at increasing
advertising-related knowledge – on young people’s susceptibility towards advertising effects, are
scarce. Moreover, the few who did examine the usefulness of such interventions, were usually
tested in the context of traditional advertising formats, whereas today’s youth is more and more
confronted with new forms of advertising. Therefore, the main purpose of this study was to fill this
void by investigating the efficacy of a media literacy training on adolescents’ advertising
susceptibility in the context of new advertising techniques.
First, the results of this study reveal that the literacy intervention could successfully stimulate
youngsters’ media literacy in terms of brand recognition, brand recall and persuasion knowledge
(H1). This is in line with previous studies investigating the effectiveness of a literacy training in the
context of television and online advertising (Chernin, 2007; Hobbs & Frost, 2003; Feshbach et al.,
1982; Wollslager, 2009).
Our second finding (H2a) showed that youngsters who participated in the media literacy class did
not exhibit an increased level of scepticism compared to those who did not participate. Moreover,
youngsters who had watched the branded music video after receiving the media literacy training,
demonstrated even less sceptical attitudes. A possible explanation for this unexpected result might
be the concept of unintended boomerang-effects. In her study about the effectiveness of media
literacy trainings in reducing media violence, Byrne (2009) has stated that when children
participated in a cognitive activity after receiving the media literacy intervention, they devoted
much more attention to and pondered more deeply about the concepts they were learning in the
lesson. This resulted in an immediate reduction in willingness to use aggression after exposure to
violent media. However, the same exact lesson without the cognitive activity led to an increase in
willingness to use aggression (i.e., a boomerang effect). It appears thus that people do indeed learn
more effectively when they are cognitively active during the process (Mayer, 2003). In order to
reduce the risk that our lesson would backfire, we always ensured that the youngsters from our
sample participated in a cognitive activity (i.e., a self-made word search) after receiving the media
literacy intervention. It could be, however, that due to the restricted time children got for this, their
willingness to devote more cognitive resources towards the educational material was not
enhanced. This could explain the reduced level of scepticism after receiving a media literacy
intervention. Another explanation for why exposure to our media literacy intervention
‘boomeranged’, is that the children might have selected and attended to the messages in
advertising formats used as examples during the lesson at the expense of the intended promotion
of critical thinking (Byrne, Linz & Potter, 2009). Since the discussion involving ad scepticism took
place rather at the end of the lesson, decreased attention seems logical.
Results from our hypotheses 2b, 3 and 5 all indicate that, although youngsters from our sample
possess persuasion knowledge, they apparently still lack or do not rely on the abilities to activate
this knowledge when confronted with advertising and apply it as a defense. That is, the persuasion
29
knowledge had no significant influence on the cultivation of critical thoughts or counterarguments
(ad scepticism) and did not decrease youngsters’ uncritical reflection regarding the used advertising
formats (attitude towards commercials, cf. Cauberghe et al. 2012). In the first scenario (lack of
skills), it means that the outcomes are in contradiction with the general assumption that children
from the age of 12 are, due to mature cognitive executive functioning skills (Moses and Baldwin,
2005), able to access their advertising knowledge and keep it at the forefront as a defensemechanism (John, 1999). Recent studies (Anderson, 2002; Pechmann et al., 2005) indeed show
some evidence that certain executive functioning skills such as impulse control and strategic
behaviour regress to some degree at the onset of adolescence3. This might explain youngsters’ poor
advertising literacy performance. In the second scenario (not relying on skills), it could be that the
activation of the critical advertising defense is hampered by the entertaining and involving context,
as it has been said that this will overwhelm their emotional regulation and rational argumentation
(Rozendaal, Buijzen & Valkenburg, 2010).
With respect to our fourth hypothesis (H4), no significant differences were found between the
treatment and control group concerning materialistic attitudes. However, as youngsters were
already very low on materialism in the control group of the study, it is less likely that a media
literacy training can still contribute to these materialistic attitudes (Moschis & Moore, 1982). A
possible explanation might be that the youngsters gave socially desirables responses, by simply
providing answers that made them look good.
From these outcomes we can conclude that, in the context of the new media environment, the
selected intervention style, which is aimed at increasing children’s advertising knowledge and
scepticism, tends to be ineffective in reducing undesired advertising effects. In our opinion,
evaluative interventions, for example, which are aimed at negatively influencing young people’s
attitudes toward the commercial and advertised products, might prove more effective.
3
In the articles, the conventional view that adolescence is roughly synonymous with ages 13-19 was adopted.
30
6. Limitations & Further Research
Finally, the limitations of the present study suggest directions for further research. First, a more
naturalistic setting (e.g., the home environment) should be used to administer the intervention in
order to reduce the possibility of socially desirable answers. Second, as argued by Rozendaal et al.
(2011), future research should pay more attention to the attitudinal, affective dimension of
advertising literacy by using interventions that focus on installing less positive and sceptical
attitudes toward advertising and its formats. Important herein is the provision of an appropriate
dose of such training sessions, as this will be crucial in achieving the desired outcome (Jeong, Cho &
Hwang, 2012). Further, young people do not only need to learn more about the array of persuasive
tactics advertisers use to influence them (Opree et al., 2013), but also about the potential negative
effects these can produce. This could give them a more accurate image of the gravity of the issue.
31
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8. Appendices
SEE CD-ROM
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