Authentic Warmth in These Uncertain Times": The Impact of Authenticity in COVID-19 Advertising on Brand Warmth and Consumer Responses
Abstract
This study investigated the impact of the perceived authenticity of brands' COVID-19 advertisements on consumers' perception of brand warmth and the subsequent responses on brand attitude and engagement intention. An online survey was used to acquire consumers' evaluations of COVID-19 video ads published between March and August in 2020. Results showed that the message authenticity significantly increased consumers' perception of brand warmth, brand attitude, and engagement intention. Furthermore, the serial mediation results revealed the underlying mechanism that authentic ads evoked positively valenced emotional responses, which increased perceived brand warmth and further resulted in positive brand attitudes and engagement intentions. Practical implications and theoretical advancement are also discussed.
Study specs
An online survey was used to gather consumer evaluations of COVID-19 video advertisements published between March and August 2020, with serial mediation analysis applied to understand emotional and perceptional mechanisms.
- Institution
- Jing Yang is affiliated with Shanghai University of Finance and Economics,Mengtian Jiang is affiliated with the University of Kentucky,and Taewan Kim is affiliated with Bowling Green State University. Shanghai University of Finance and Economics,University of Kentucky,Bowling Green State University
- Discipline
- Marketing
- Study Type
- Survey Research
- Year
- 2025
- Human Data Platform
- Prolific
- Source
- View Source DOI Google Scholar
Measured Outcomes
The relationship between perceived message authenticity in COVID-19 ads, brand warmth, emotional responses, brand attitudes, and engagement intentions.
Peer Review & Critical Discussion
Potential Selection Bias in 2023 Cohort
The participant pool shows a concerning overrepresentation of users from high-income demographics. Looking at Table 3, we can see that 78% of respondents had annual incomes above $75k, which significantly limits the generalizability of these findings to broader populations.
Non-naive Participants Issue
I've noticed a methodological concern regarding participant naivety. Given that Prolific users often complete multiple studies, there's a real risk that participants had prior exposure to similar experimental paradigms, which could confound the results.
RLHF Applicability to This Study Design
The implications for RLHF training pipelines are understated. If we accept the authors' conclusions about preference stability, this has direct consequences for how we should structure reward model training. The temporal decay effect described in Section 4.2 is particularly relevant.
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