Are advertising campaigns for water conservation in Latin America persuasive? A mixed-method approach

SÁNCHEZ, CAROLINA; BIANCHI, ENRIQUE CARLOS; RODRIGUEZ-SANCHEZ, CARLA; SANCHO-ESPER, FRANCO

International Review on Public and Nonprofit Marketing

Springer Alemania

Lugar: Verlag GmbH; Año: 2023

1865-1984

he United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development calls for an urgent reduction of global water footprint. Communication is crucial to respond to this call. However, most water conservation communication campaigns use the knowledge deficit model and overlook persuasive techniques. This paper presents a mixed-method approach consisting of exploratory sequential qualitative (content) analysis followed by a quantitative (cluster) analysis. This approach was used to explore the communication strategies of 95 advertisements promoting water conservation in Latin America. Four widely used persuasion frameworks were analyzed: (1) the elaboration likelihood model (ELM), (2) prospect theory (gains vs. losses), (3) the action framework (i.e., do more vs. take less), and (4) the temporal distance frame. Regarding persuasive characteristics (ELM model), most ads excluded behavioral beneficiaries (58%) and included explicit (60%) and active (52%) messages. Virtually all ads (87%) had a deno