‘I had no idea that greenwashing was even a thing’: identifying the cognitive mechanisms of exemplars in greenwashing literacy interventions

Abstract

As individuals become more aware and concerned about their own contribution to global climate change, empowering consumers to make informed decisions that are beneficial to the environment is of chief importance. This study tests how literacy interventions can be used to empower and increase people’s ability to identify greenwashing as a defense against for-profit organizations who seek to elevate the attractiveness of their products using deceptive appeals. Relying on work from the communications and education disciplines, this work seeks to inform best practices for designing simple greenwashing literacy interventions. Using a between-subjects experiment (N = 476), we found that vividness was rated the highest in a literacy intervention that embedded both textual quotes and image exemplars, which increased literacy outcomes. Similarly, the quote-only condition fully mediated the relationship between the intervention and literacy outcomes. Neither cognitive load nor the availability heuristic significantly mediated the intervention and literacy outcomes. This research offers important theoretical and practical implications for using exemplars as educational tools on social media.

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Keywords:

• Greenwashing
• exemplars
• vividness
• greenwashing literacy
• media literacy
• climate change

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the Public Relations Research Group at Penn State University, led by Dr. Denise Bortree, for their support and feedback on this project. We would also like to thank the journal’s editor and anonymous reviewers’ feedback on this manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential competing interest was reported by the authors.

Funding

This study was supported by the Brigham Young School of Communications Wendell J. Ashton Research Professorship Fund.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Nicholas Eng

Nicholas Eng (M.S. North Carolina State University) is a third-year doctoral student at the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications at Penn State University. His research focuses on strategic communication of issues relating to science, health, the environment and risk as well as psychological and cognitive processing.

Carlina DiRusso

Carlina DiRusso (Ph.D., Pennsylvania State University) is an assistant professor of communication at Hope College in Holland, MI. Her research focuses on strategic health and science communication in digital media.

Cassandra L. C. Troy

Cassandra LC Troy is a mass communications Ph.D. student at The Pennsylvania State University. She also has an MS in communication (2018) from Purdue University, and a BFA in communication arts and a BA in foreign language (2014) with an emphasis in German from Virginia Commonwealth University. Cassandra’s research focuses on science and environmental communication, specifically how communication can contribute to engagement in pro-environmental action at individual and community scales. So far her research has explored efficacy perceptions, risk perceptions, and moralization of environmental topics and she utilizes both quantitative and qualitative methodology.

Jason R. Freeman

Jason R. Freeman received a Ph.D. in mass communications from Pennsylvania State University in 2020. He also earned an MA in mass communications (2017) and a BA in communications with an emphasis in advertising from Brigham Young University (2013). Jason’s is interested in topics that intersect with advertising ethics and persuasion. This includes ongoing work that examines native advertising, children in advertising, and environmental advertising. Jason’s research relies heavily on quantitative approaches, though he also appreciates and utilizes qualitative techniques in his work. Jason is specifically interested in the psychological consequences of media use and studies outcomes in this area across the human developmental lifespan. Jason has been published in academic journals that include the Journal of Promotion Management, The Journal of Social Media and Society, and Addiction Research and Theory.

Meng Qi Liao

MengQi (Maggie) Liao Mengqi (Maggie) Liao is a second-year Ph.D. student at the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications at Penn State University. She investigates the process and psychological effects of human interactions with communication technology, including mobile devices, social media, and artificial intelligence (AI). Her research aims to gain a deep understanding of the effects of different technological affordances and features of communication technology on users’ cognitive information processing and user experience. She has conducted several projects regarding the effects of media affordances, and how individual differences, including different psychological traits and cognitive styles, influence the effects of such affordances. She strives to provide insights for design solutions to achieve better user experiences, promoting well-being, enabling users to make more informed decisions when encountering online deception. Her current research emphasis on how the different concerns raised by the emerging technology (e.g. privacy concerns; algorithm aversion; overdependence on mobile phones; misinformation and disinformation) could be addressed through tailoring technological affordances to meet the needs of users with different characteristics.

Yuan Sun

Yuan Sun (M.A. Pennsylvania State University) is a Ph.D. student at the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications of Pennsylvania State University. Her research interests include artificial intelligence and digital communication, social media, and health communication.