The persuasive effects of social media narrative PSAs on COVID-19 vaccination intention among unvaccinated young adults: the mediating role of empathy and psychological reactance

Abstract

Purpose Successful social marketing campaign to promote COVID-19 vaccination for the unvaccinated relies on increasing positive reactions but also reducing negative responses to persuasive messages. This study aims to investigate the relative effects of narrative vs non-narrative public service announcements (PSAs) promoting COVID-19 vaccination on both positive and negative reactions. Using social media as a tool for disseminating marketing campaigns provides a great opportunity to examine the effectiveness of narrative PSAs on vaccination intention, especially among unvaccinated young adults, who were the target audience of the social marketing. This study explores the role of empathy and psychological reactance as underlying mechanisms. Design/methodology/approach An experiment involving unvaccinated young adults was conducted with a one-factor, two-condition (message type: narrative vs non-narrative) design. Findings Results indicated that the narrative (vs non-narrative) PSAs led to greater empathy. While no direct effects of message type emerged on psychological reactance or vaccination intention, results of a serial multi-mediator model confirmed that empathy and psychological reactance mediated the effects of message type on vaccination intention. Originality/value The study extends the understanding of narrative persuasion by examining an underlying mechanism behind narrative persuasion in a COVID-19 PSA. This study provides empirical evidence of the important role of empathy in processing narrative PSAs. Moreover, the current study expands narrative persuasion’s applicability to COVID-19 vaccination intervention messages for unvaccinated young adults, highlighting the effectiveness of narrative persuasion as a social marketing communication tool.

Feeling inspired and nostalgic: associations between media context-induced positive emotions and behavioral change among vaccine-hesitant individuals in the late stages of the COVID-19 pandemic

“…Campaigners might also need to pay attention to designing messages eliciting positive emotions and favorable perceptions of humanity, rather than messages that arouse negative emotions and convey explicit persuasive intents (Myrick and Oliver, 2015). That way, vaccine-hesitant consumers might be less likely to engage in counter-arguing against the pro-vaccination message position (Ko et al , 2023). More research is needed to understand the influence of positive emotions deriving from entertainment media consumption in the context of vaccine hesitancy to provide specific and insightful practical implications.…”