The Effectiveness of Guilt Advertising Appeals on Consumers’ Intention to Purchase within the Social Media Environment

This study seeks to explore how guilt appeals in social media advertising influence consumers’ intentions to make purchases. Through a literature review and hypothesis development, the research analyzes the influences of social media context, guilt appeal advertising, self-efficacy, and the Affect-Behavior-Cognition (ABC) model on purchase intentions. An experimental approach was employed to examine the impact of guilt appeal advertisements on consumers’ purchase intentions by comparing them with advertisements that did not use guilt appeals. The results indicate that guilt appeal advertisements significantly increase consumers’ guilt and have a positive impact on their attitudes toward advertisements and on their intentions to make a purchase. Self-efficacy plays a moderating role between guilt and purchase intentions, while guilt serves as a partial mediator between advertisement attitudes and purchase intentions. These findings hold important implications for advertising and social media marketing, highlighting the role of guilt appeals in attracting consumer attention and enhancing behavioral intentions, and revealing the application of self-efficacy in consumer behavior research.