The Behavioral Responses of Consumers to the Intensity and Type of Fear Appeals Used in Anti-Obesity Advertisements: An Experimental Study on College Students in Tehran
,
Abstract
Introduction: Some communicators resort to negative appeals such as fear to encourage consumers to healthy behaviors. Nonetheless, the effectiveness of this type of content is yet questioned. Present study has been conducted to investigate how fear intensity and fear type applied in anti-obesity advertisements prompt preventive behavior among consumers.
Methods: 208 college students in Tehran province were randomly classified in 7 groups (6 experimental and 1 control group) based on a factorial design; 2 (fear intensity: high and low) x 3 (fear type: physical, social, and reappraisal). Research hypotheses were tested applying appropriate statistical tests including structural equation modeling and analysis of variance, based on data gathered through questionnaire and interventions such as presenting participants with visual contents.
Findings: it was revealed that there is a significant and positive relationship between the perceived severity and perceived fear, as well as between perceived susceptibility and perceived fear, and also between perceived fear and behavioral intention. Analysis of variance confirmed the significant main effect of fear intensity on behavioral intention. The main effect of the fear type on behavioral intention was not approved. However, findings indicate the significant interaction effect of fear intensity and fear type on behavioral intention so that highly intense messages that representing physical harm and lowly intense messages that representing social harm stimulate more behavioral intention.
Conclusion: It is concluded that applying fear appeal in health warning advertisements is effective in inviting consumers to healthy behavior, especially once a proper combination of the type and intensity of fear is applied in messages.
1. Wymer W. Rethinking the boundaries of social marketing: Activism or advertising? Journal of Business Research. 2010;63(2):99-103.
2. World Health Organization. Obesity and overweight Fact sheet World Health Organization; 2018 [cited 2019 January 3]. Available from: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs311/en/.
3. CDC. Adult Obesity Causes & Consequences: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; 2019 [cited 2019 January 1]. Available from: https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/adult/causes.html.
4. Chan K, Prendergast G, Grønhøj A, Bech-Larsen T. Communicating healthy eating to adolescents. Journal of Consumer Marketing. 2009;26(1):6-14.
5. Kasen S, Cohen P, Chen H, Must A. Obesity and psychopathology in women: a three decade prospective study. International Journal of Obesity. 2008;32(3):558-66.
6. Luppino FS, de Wit LM, Bouvy PF, Stijnen T, Cuijpers P, Penninx BW, et al. Overweight, obesity, and depression: a systematic review and meta-analysis of longitudinal studies. Archives of general psychiatry. 2010;67(3):220-9.
7. World Health Organization. Overweight and obesity: World Health Organization; 2017 [cited 2019 3 January]. Available from: http://gamapserver.who.int/gho/interactive_charts/ncd/risk_factors/overweight/atlas.html.
8. Rahmani A, Sayehmiri K, Asadollahi K, Sarokhani D, Islami F, Sarokhani M. Investigation of the Prevalence of Obesity in Iran: a Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Study. Acta Medica Iranica. 2015;53(10):596-607.
9. Dixon H, Scully M, Durkin S, Brennan E, Cotter T, Maloney S, et al. Finding the keys to successful adult-targeted advertisements on obesity prevention: an experimental audience testing study. BMC public health. 2015;15(1): 804.
10. Wakefield MA, Loken B, Hornik RC. Use of mass media campaigns to change healthbehaviour. The Lancet. 2010;376(9748):1261-71.
11. Rodgers S, Thorson E. Advertising theory. New York: Routledge; 2012.
12. Kotler P, Keller KL, Brady M, Goodman M, Hansen T. Marketing management: Pearson UK; 2019.
13. Solomon MR. Consumer behavior: Buying, having, and being. 12th ed. United States: Pearson; 2017.
14. Williams KC. Fear appeal theory. Research in Business and Economics Journal. 2012;5(1):1-21.
15. Witte K, Allen M. A meta-analysis of fear appeals: Implications for effective public health campaigns. Health education & behavior. 2000;27(5):591-615.
16. Simpson CC, Griffin BJ, Mazzeo SE. Psychological and behavioral effects of obesity prevention campaigns. Journal of health psychology. 2019;24(9):1268-81.
17. Bailey RL, Wang T, Kaiser CK. Clash of the primary motivations: Motivated processing of emotionally experienced content in fear appeals about obesity prevention. Health communication. 2018;33(2):111-21.
18. Puhl R, Luedicke J, Peterson JL. Public reactions to obesity-related health campaigns: a randomized controlled trial. American journal of preventive medicine. 2013;45(1):36-48.
19. Dooley JA, Deshpande S, Adair CE. Comparing adolescent-focused obesity prevention and reduction messages. Journal of Business Research. 2010;63(2):154-60.
20. Krishen AS, Bui M. Fear advertisements: Influencing consumers to make better health decisions. International Journal of Advertising. 2015;34(3):533-48.
21. Tannenbaum MB, Hepler J, Zimmerman RS, Saul L, Jacobs S, Wilson K, et al. Appealing to fear: A meta-analysis of fear appeal effectiveness and theories. Psychological bulletin. 2015;141(6):1178.
22. Ruiter RA, Kessels LT, Peters GJY, Kok G. Sixty years of fear appeal research: Current state of the evidence. International journal of psychology. 2014;49(2):63-70.
23. Keller PA. Converting the unconverted: the effect of inclination and opportunity to discount health-related fear appeals. Journal of Applied Psychology. 1999;84(3):403.
24. Leventhal H. Fear appeals and persuasion: the differentiation of a motivational construct. American Journal of Public Health. 1971;61(6):1208-24.
25. Witte K. Putting the fear back into fear appeals: The extended parallel process model. Communications Monographs. 1992;59(4):329-49.
26. Rogers RW. A protection motivation theory of fear appeals and attitude change1. The journal of psychology. 1975;91(1):93-114.
27. Terblanche-Smit M. The impact of fear appeal advertising on disposition formation in HIV/Aids related communication: Stellenbosch: Stellenbosch University; 2008.
28. Johnston AC, Warkentin M. Fear appeals and information security behaviors: an empirical study. MIS quarterly. 2010:549-66.
29. Bandura A. Self-efficacy: toward a unifying theory of behavioral change. Psychological review. 1977;84(2):191.
30. Andrews JC, Netemeyer RG, Kees J, Burton S. How Graphic Visual Health Warnings Affect Young Smokers' Thoughts of Quitting. Journal of Marketing Research. 2014;51(2):165-83.
31. Arthur D, Quester P. Who's afraid of that ad? Applying segmentation to the protection motivation model. Psychology & Marketing. 2004;21(9):671-96.
32. Tanner Jr JF, Hunt JB, Eppright DR. The protection motivation model: A normative model of fear appeals. The Journal of Marketing. 1991:36-45.
33. Talukdar D, Lindsey C. To buy or not to buy: Consumers' demand response patterns for healthy versus unhealthy food. Journal of Marketing. 2013;77(2):124-38.
34. Rayner E, Baxter SM, Ilicic J. Smoker's recall of fear appeal imagery: Examining the effect of fear intensity and fear type. Australasian Marketing Journal (AMJ). 2015;23(1):61-6.
35. LaTour MS, Pitts RE. Using fear appeals in advertising for AIDS prevention in the college-age population. J Health Care Mark. 1989;9(3):5–14.
36. LaTour MS, Rotfield HJ. There are threats and (maybe) fear-caused arousal: theory and confusions of appeals to fear and fear arousal itself. J Advert 1997;26(3):45–59.
37. Terblanche-Smit M, Terblanche NS. Race and attitude formation in HIV/Aids fear advertising. Journal of Business Research. 2010;63(2):121-5.
38. LaTour MS, Zahra SA. Fear appeals as advertising strategy: should they be used? J Consum Mark. 1989;6(2):61–70.
39. Duke CR, Pickett GM, Carlson L, Grove SJ. A method for evaluating the ethics of fear appeals. Journal of Public Policy & Marketing 1993:120-9.40. Murdock MR, Rajagopal P. The Sting of Social: How Emphasizing Social Consequences in Warning Messages Influences Perceptions of Risk. Journal of Marketing. 2017;81:83–98.
41. Hammond D, Thrasher J, Reid JL, Driezen P, Boudreau C, Santillán EA. Perceived effectiveness of pictorial health warnings among Mexican youth and adults: a population-level intervention with potential to reduce tobacco-related inequities. Cancer Causes & Control. 2012;23(1):57-67.
42. Reardon J, Miller C. Smoking prevention messages for adolescents: how intensity, valence, and recipient of consequences affect attitude toward the ad and intent to smoke. J Mark Theory Pract 2008;16(1):67–77.
43. Ray RD, McRae K, Ochsner KN, Gross JJ. Cognitive reappraisal of negative affect: converging evidence from EMG and self-report. Emotion. 2010;10(4):587.
44. Giuliani NR, Calcott RD, Berkman ET. Piece of cake. Cognitive reappraisal of food craving. Appetite. 2013;64:56-61.
45. Yokum S, Stice E. Cognitive regulation of food craving: effects of three cognitive reappraisal strategies on neural response to palatable foods. International journal of obesity. 2013;37(12):1565.
46. Wolburg JM. College students’ responses to antismoking messages: Denial, defiance, and other boomerang effects. Journal of Consumer Affairs. 2006;40(2):294-323.
47. Schneider S, Gadinger M, Fischer A. Does the effect go up in smoke? A randomized controlled trial of pictorial warnings on cigarette packaging. Patient education and counseling. 2012;86(1):77-83.
48. Zhao X, Nan X, Yang B, Alexandra Iles I. Cigarette warning labels: graphics, framing,and identity. Health Education. 2014;114(2):101-17.
49. Kees J. Advertising framing effects and consideration of future consequences. Journal of Consumer Affairs. 2011;45(1):7-32.
50. Witte K, Berkowitz JM, Cameron KA, McKeon JK. Preventing the spread of genital warts: Using fear appeals to promote self-protective behaviors. Health Education & Behavior. 1998;25(5):571-85.
51. Redd BR. Using the protection motivation theory to examine the effects of obesity fear arousal on the physical activity of young adult female college students [PhD Thesis]. Detroit, Michigan: Wayne State University; 2012.
52. Bagozzi RP, Yi Y. Specification, evaluation, and interpretation of structural equation models. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science. 2012;40(1):8-34.
53. Joreskog KG, Sorbom D, Magidson J. Advances in factor analysis and structural equation models. 1979.
54. Fornell C, Larcker DF. Structural equation models with unobservable variables and measurement error: Algebra and statistics. SAGE Publications Sage CA: Los Angeles, CA; 1981.
55. Cramer D. Introducing statistics for social research: Step-by-step calculations and computer techniques using SPSS: Routledge; 1994.
56. Hair JF. Multivariate data analysis. 2010.
57. Powell FA. The effect of anxiety‐arousing messages when related to personal, familial, and impersonal referents. Communications Monographs. 1965;32(2):102-6.
58. Schoenbachler DD, Whittler TE. Adolescent processing of social and physical threat communications. Journal of advertising. 1996;25(4):37-54.
2. World Health Organization. Obesity and overweight Fact sheet World Health Organization; 2018 [cited 2019 January 3]. Available from: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs311/en/.
3. CDC. Adult Obesity Causes & Consequences: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; 2019 [cited 2019 January 1]. Available from: https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/adult/causes.html.
4. Chan K, Prendergast G, Grønhøj A, Bech-Larsen T. Communicating healthy eating to adolescents. Journal of Consumer Marketing. 2009;26(1):6-14.
5. Kasen S, Cohen P, Chen H, Must A. Obesity and psychopathology in women: a three decade prospective study. International Journal of Obesity. 2008;32(3):558-66.
6. Luppino FS, de Wit LM, Bouvy PF, Stijnen T, Cuijpers P, Penninx BW, et al. Overweight, obesity, and depression: a systematic review and meta-analysis of longitudinal studies. Archives of general psychiatry. 2010;67(3):220-9.
7. World Health Organization. Overweight and obesity: World Health Organization; 2017 [cited 2019 3 January]. Available from: http://gamapserver.who.int/gho/interactive_charts/ncd/risk_factors/overweight/atlas.html.
8. Rahmani A, Sayehmiri K, Asadollahi K, Sarokhani D, Islami F, Sarokhani M. Investigation of the Prevalence of Obesity in Iran: a Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Study. Acta Medica Iranica. 2015;53(10):596-607.
9. Dixon H, Scully M, Durkin S, Brennan E, Cotter T, Maloney S, et al. Finding the keys to successful adult-targeted advertisements on obesity prevention: an experimental audience testing study. BMC public health. 2015;15(1): 804.
10. Wakefield MA, Loken B, Hornik RC. Use of mass media campaigns to change healthbehaviour. The Lancet. 2010;376(9748):1261-71.
11. Rodgers S, Thorson E. Advertising theory. New York: Routledge; 2012.
12. Kotler P, Keller KL, Brady M, Goodman M, Hansen T. Marketing management: Pearson UK; 2019.
13. Solomon MR. Consumer behavior: Buying, having, and being. 12th ed. United States: Pearson; 2017.
14. Williams KC. Fear appeal theory. Research in Business and Economics Journal. 2012;5(1):1-21.
15. Witte K, Allen M. A meta-analysis of fear appeals: Implications for effective public health campaigns. Health education & behavior. 2000;27(5):591-615.
16. Simpson CC, Griffin BJ, Mazzeo SE. Psychological and behavioral effects of obesity prevention campaigns. Journal of health psychology. 2019;24(9):1268-81.
17. Bailey RL, Wang T, Kaiser CK. Clash of the primary motivations: Motivated processing of emotionally experienced content in fear appeals about obesity prevention. Health communication. 2018;33(2):111-21.
18. Puhl R, Luedicke J, Peterson JL. Public reactions to obesity-related health campaigns: a randomized controlled trial. American journal of preventive medicine. 2013;45(1):36-48.
19. Dooley JA, Deshpande S, Adair CE. Comparing adolescent-focused obesity prevention and reduction messages. Journal of Business Research. 2010;63(2):154-60.
20. Krishen AS, Bui M. Fear advertisements: Influencing consumers to make better health decisions. International Journal of Advertising. 2015;34(3):533-48.
21. Tannenbaum MB, Hepler J, Zimmerman RS, Saul L, Jacobs S, Wilson K, et al. Appealing to fear: A meta-analysis of fear appeal effectiveness and theories. Psychological bulletin. 2015;141(6):1178.
22. Ruiter RA, Kessels LT, Peters GJY, Kok G. Sixty years of fear appeal research: Current state of the evidence. International journal of psychology. 2014;49(2):63-70.
23. Keller PA. Converting the unconverted: the effect of inclination and opportunity to discount health-related fear appeals. Journal of Applied Psychology. 1999;84(3):403.
24. Leventhal H. Fear appeals and persuasion: the differentiation of a motivational construct. American Journal of Public Health. 1971;61(6):1208-24.
25. Witte K. Putting the fear back into fear appeals: The extended parallel process model. Communications Monographs. 1992;59(4):329-49.
26. Rogers RW. A protection motivation theory of fear appeals and attitude change1. The journal of psychology. 1975;91(1):93-114.
27. Terblanche-Smit M. The impact of fear appeal advertising on disposition formation in HIV/Aids related communication: Stellenbosch: Stellenbosch University; 2008.
28. Johnston AC, Warkentin M. Fear appeals and information security behaviors: an empirical study. MIS quarterly. 2010:549-66.
29. Bandura A. Self-efficacy: toward a unifying theory of behavioral change. Psychological review. 1977;84(2):191.
30. Andrews JC, Netemeyer RG, Kees J, Burton S. How Graphic Visual Health Warnings Affect Young Smokers' Thoughts of Quitting. Journal of Marketing Research. 2014;51(2):165-83.
31. Arthur D, Quester P. Who's afraid of that ad? Applying segmentation to the protection motivation model. Psychology & Marketing. 2004;21(9):671-96.
32. Tanner Jr JF, Hunt JB, Eppright DR. The protection motivation model: A normative model of fear appeals. The Journal of Marketing. 1991:36-45.
33. Talukdar D, Lindsey C. To buy or not to buy: Consumers' demand response patterns for healthy versus unhealthy food. Journal of Marketing. 2013;77(2):124-38.
34. Rayner E, Baxter SM, Ilicic J. Smoker's recall of fear appeal imagery: Examining the effect of fear intensity and fear type. Australasian Marketing Journal (AMJ). 2015;23(1):61-6.
35. LaTour MS, Pitts RE. Using fear appeals in advertising for AIDS prevention in the college-age population. J Health Care Mark. 1989;9(3):5–14.
36. LaTour MS, Rotfield HJ. There are threats and (maybe) fear-caused arousal: theory and confusions of appeals to fear and fear arousal itself. J Advert 1997;26(3):45–59.
37. Terblanche-Smit M, Terblanche NS. Race and attitude formation in HIV/Aids fear advertising. Journal of Business Research. 2010;63(2):121-5.
38. LaTour MS, Zahra SA. Fear appeals as advertising strategy: should they be used? J Consum Mark. 1989;6(2):61–70.
39. Duke CR, Pickett GM, Carlson L, Grove SJ. A method for evaluating the ethics of fear appeals. Journal of Public Policy & Marketing 1993:120-9.40. Murdock MR, Rajagopal P. The Sting of Social: How Emphasizing Social Consequences in Warning Messages Influences Perceptions of Risk. Journal of Marketing. 2017;81:83–98.
41. Hammond D, Thrasher J, Reid JL, Driezen P, Boudreau C, Santillán EA. Perceived effectiveness of pictorial health warnings among Mexican youth and adults: a population-level intervention with potential to reduce tobacco-related inequities. Cancer Causes & Control. 2012;23(1):57-67.
42. Reardon J, Miller C. Smoking prevention messages for adolescents: how intensity, valence, and recipient of consequences affect attitude toward the ad and intent to smoke. J Mark Theory Pract 2008;16(1):67–77.
43. Ray RD, McRae K, Ochsner KN, Gross JJ. Cognitive reappraisal of negative affect: converging evidence from EMG and self-report. Emotion. 2010;10(4):587.
44. Giuliani NR, Calcott RD, Berkman ET. Piece of cake. Cognitive reappraisal of food craving. Appetite. 2013;64:56-61.
45. Yokum S, Stice E. Cognitive regulation of food craving: effects of three cognitive reappraisal strategies on neural response to palatable foods. International journal of obesity. 2013;37(12):1565.
46. Wolburg JM. College students’ responses to antismoking messages: Denial, defiance, and other boomerang effects. Journal of Consumer Affairs. 2006;40(2):294-323.
47. Schneider S, Gadinger M, Fischer A. Does the effect go up in smoke? A randomized controlled trial of pictorial warnings on cigarette packaging. Patient education and counseling. 2012;86(1):77-83.
48. Zhao X, Nan X, Yang B, Alexandra Iles I. Cigarette warning labels: graphics, framing,and identity. Health Education. 2014;114(2):101-17.
49. Kees J. Advertising framing effects and consideration of future consequences. Journal of Consumer Affairs. 2011;45(1):7-32.
50. Witte K, Berkowitz JM, Cameron KA, McKeon JK. Preventing the spread of genital warts: Using fear appeals to promote self-protective behaviors. Health Education & Behavior. 1998;25(5):571-85.
51. Redd BR. Using the protection motivation theory to examine the effects of obesity fear arousal on the physical activity of young adult female college students [PhD Thesis]. Detroit, Michigan: Wayne State University; 2012.
52. Bagozzi RP, Yi Y. Specification, evaluation, and interpretation of structural equation models. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science. 2012;40(1):8-34.
53. Joreskog KG, Sorbom D, Magidson J. Advances in factor analysis and structural equation models. 1979.
54. Fornell C, Larcker DF. Structural equation models with unobservable variables and measurement error: Algebra and statistics. SAGE Publications Sage CA: Los Angeles, CA; 1981.
55. Cramer D. Introducing statistics for social research: Step-by-step calculations and computer techniques using SPSS: Routledge; 1994.
56. Hair JF. Multivariate data analysis. 2010.
57. Powell FA. The effect of anxiety‐arousing messages when related to personal, familial, and impersonal referents. Communications Monographs. 1965;32(2):102-6.
58. Schoenbachler DD, Whittler TE. Adolescent processing of social and physical threat communications. Journal of advertising. 1996;25(4):37-54.
| Files | ||
| Issue | Vol 5 No 4 (2019) | |
| Section | Original Article(s) | |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.18502/jbe.v5i4.3868 | |
| Keywords | ||
| Social Marketing Obesity Fear Appeal Severity Susceptibility Behavioral Intention | ||
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How to Cite
1.
Eshghipour N, Jafari P, Ekhtiari H. The Behavioral Responses of Consumers to the Intensity and Type of Fear Appeals Used in Anti-Obesity Advertisements: An Experimental Study on College Students in Tehran. JBE. 2020;5(4):279-288.
