Effects of Negative Political Advertising and Message Repetition on Candidate Evaluation

Abstract

A great deal of televised political advertising is seen every electoral year. Expenditures on this type of political communication have reached the all-time high in the past elections. Clearly, political candidates believe that televised political advertising is an effective way to communicate with voters. This study investigates the effects of repetition of negative political ads on candidate evaluations. A pilot study shows situations in which repetition can both benefit and harm the evaluation of the sponsor of a negative political ad. The main study explores a factor that makes a negative political ad more effective, increasing positive reactions toward the sponsor and negative reactions toward the target of the ad. Implications of these results for society, attitudes, and learning are discussed.

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank the invaluable input of Lynda L. Kaid (in memoriam) and Juliano Laran to earlier versions of this article. The help of the editor and the two anonymous reviewers is also greatly appreciated.

Notes

Previous studies about advertising repetition (Batra & Ray, 1986; Becker & Doolittle, 1975; Belch, 1982; Cacioppo & Petty, 1979; Rethans, Swasy, & Marks, 1986) have used the term “moderate exposure” to denote an intermediate number of exposures to an ad. In general, these studies assume that one exposure is low exposure, two or three is moderate, and more than three is considered high exposure.

Massive repetition refers to when the same message appears close together during a given interval. For example, when the same message is repeated sequentially in a commercial break or the same message is seen several times in a very short period.

The names of the candidates, as well as the brands in the product advertisements, were omitted in this article to avoid copyright infringement.

Note. N = 151.

^a n = 59.

^b n = 49.

^c n = 43.

The name of the television show used in this study is omitted to avoid copyright infringement.

Note. S = TV show; F = filler ad; T = target ad.

⁵In fact, five DVDs were created. This fifth DVD was used in the pretest (Main Study) and it only had one insertion of the negative political ad (see Table 2).

⁶Values do not add up to 100% because of missing values.

Note. N = 393.

^a n = 87.

^b n = 67.

^c n = 81.

^d n = 97.

^e n = 61.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Juliana Fernandes

Juliana Fernandes (Ph.D., University of Florida, 2010) is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Strategic Communication at the University of Miami. Her research interests include affective impact of advertising, social media and online communication, and international political communication.