The effect of advertising skepticism on consumer attitudes

Advertising has always been one of the strategic tools in reaching consumers and directing their behavior in the desired way. The effectiveness of the messages sent to the consumers via advertisements depends on persuading them. The simultaneity of numerous informations gradually complicates the process. There are determining factors in the persuasion of messages sent through advertisements. One of these factors is skepticism. The main research questions of the current study, which was handled within the theoretical framework of Elaboration Likelihood Model that proposes the exixtence of two different routes to persuation, are threefold. The first quesiton is whether advertising skepticism affects advertising effectiveness as factor determining elaboration level. The second research question deals with the possible effect of interaction between advertising skepticism and argument strength on advertising effectivess dimensions. And the final questions tries to answer whether the interaction between advertising skepticism and using celebrity endorsers in effective on advertising effectivess dimensions. Advertising skepticism has recently been subject to a limited number of research, and therefore, it was considered appropriate and contributory not only to the academy but also to the practitioners, to analyze the topic in different contexts. In order to test the hypothesis developed on the subject, a between-subjects experimental design model was developed with 2 (argument qualirt: strong vs weak) * 2 (cue: celebrity vs noncelebrity status) manipulations, where advertising skepticism acts as the independant variable. The results of the MANOVA analyses that was conducted with the research data gathered by using the printed ads developed through pre-tests revealed that advertising skepticism affects advertising effectiveness and thus, it is an important construct that shoud be considered in advertising effectiveness studies. The resulst also revealed the effect of skepticism * argument strenght interaction only on ad attitude and brand attitude, and valid for the consumers with high skepticism; whereas skepticism * celebrity endoreser interaction affects consumers with low skepticism on three of their attitudes measured, which were ad credibility, ad attitude, and brand attitude. The research significantly contributes to the literature not only because of its analyzing the skepticism subject and revealing findings regarding its interaction with other factors; but also thanks to its handling the topic within the ELM framework. The study provides undeniable contributions both for the academy and for the practitioners when the limited number of researches on the topic are considered.