Children’s Hobbies as Persuasive Strategies: The Role of Literacy Training in Children’s Responses to Personalized Ads

Abstract

In today’s online environment, children inevitably encounter personalized advertising. However, research suggests that children are not yet able to cope with this advertising type. This study therefore investigates whether literacy training helps children recognize personalized advertising. The 2 (personalized versus nonpersonalized ad) × 2 (literacy training versus no training) between-subjects design experiment (N = 166) suggests that personalized advertising decreased children’s (9 to 13 years) brand attitude but increased their purchase intentions. Moreover, training helped children to better recognize personalized ads. Contrary to the expectations, this targeting recognition positively affected brand attitude and purchase intentions.

Acknowledgment

We would like to thank Thibaut Deman for his extensive work regarding creation of the stimuli, collection of the data, and general research management.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by the Special Research Fund of Ghent University (BOF.STA.2017.0009.01.IV1, funded doctoral fellowship of the first author; BOF.2018.0031.01, (funded postdoctoral fellowship of the third author) and the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO.3E0.2015.0035.01, funded postdoctoral fellowship of the second author).

Notes on contributors

Laurien Desimpelaere

Laurien Desimpelaere (PhD, Ghent University) is affiliated with the Department of Communication Sciences, Ghent University.

Liselot Hudders

Liselot Hudders (PhD, Ghent University) is an associate professor, Department of Communication Sciences, and a postdoctoral fellow of the FWO, Marketing Department, Ghent University.

Dieneke Van de Sompel

Dieneke Van de Sompel (PhD, Ghent University) is an assistant professor, Department of Communication Sciences, Ghent University.