Ethical Judgments of Political Television Commercials as Predictors of Attitude toward the Ad

Abstract

This study examines the impact of ethical judgments about televised political commercials on global attitude toward the ad. Findings from the quasi-experiment indicate that the “ethical” attribute belongs to a set of salient, “utilitarian” cognitions that influence how political commercials are evaluated. These findings suggest that ethical perceptions really matter. However, certain emotional “hedonic” cognitive responses, which voters say are nonsalient in their overall evaluations of political ads, in fact may circumvent the powerful impact of ethical—and other salient—cognitive elements. Implications for political advertising strategy and public policy are discussed.