The influence of different fear appeal approaches and gender on young generation Y consumers' protection motivation responses

Efforts to change dysfunctional social behaviour such as smoking and alcohol drinking-and-driving has been the focus of considerable research attention in attempts to prevent or at least reduce the occurrence and re-occurrence of dysfunctional behaviour. Despite these efforts, many questions remain....

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Bibliographic Details
Published inManagement dynamics Vol. 25; no. 4; pp. 19 - 33
Main Authors Toerien, Lucea, Boshoff, Christo, Bührer, Stephanie
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Stellenbosch Southern African Institute for Management Scientists 01.10.2016
Subjects
Advertising campaigns
Alcohol
Alcohol use
Behavior
Behavior change
Behavior modification
Campaigns
College students
Communication
Consumers
Consumption
Fatalities
Fear & phobias
Frame analysis
Gender
Health education
Health psychology
Influence
Marketing
Millennials
Motivation
Perceptions
Prevention
Roads & highways
Self-efficacy
Smoking
Social behavior
Social marketing
Social psychology
Threats
Vulnerability
Warnings
Young adults
South Africa
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Summary:Efforts to change dysfunctional social behaviour such as smoking and alcohol drinking-and-driving has been the focus of considerable research attention in attempts to prevent or at least reduce the occurrence and re-occurrence of dysfunctional behaviour. Despite these efforts, many questions remain. One of them is the effectiveness of fear-based appeals in social communication campaigns as years of research have still not produced conclusive evidence as to whether this communication approach is successful in modifying dysfunctional behaviour. One reason why the use of fear appeal effectiveness has been called into question is the defensive reactions that fearbased messages may arouse. To reduce the occurence of these defensive mechanisms, the use of a new fear appeal approach in social communication campaigns has been suggested, namely question-based warnings. The primary objective of this study was to investigate whether different fear appeal framing approaches (question-based vs statement-based framing) and gender would influence relatively young generation Y consumers' protection motivation differently when exposed to an anti-drinking-and-driving campaign. The results revealed that statement-based warnings evoked greater feelings of vulnerability, self-efficacy perceptions and behavioural intent amongst females than question-based warnings. In the case of the males, however, the type of fear appeal approach used is inconsequential as different fear appeal approaches do not influence their protection motivation responses differently.
ISSN:1019-567X