Effects of sponsorship disclosure on television viewers ’ responses

The proliferation of sponsored content in television programs has been a cause of concern as it may violate the right of consumers to know that a message is sponsored. Therefore, new regulations obligate broadcasters to disclose sponsored content. To achieve its goal of informing the consumer, a sponsorship disclosure must be effectively communicated. This study explores how audience and disclosure characteristics infl uence memory of sponsorship disclosure. Results show that disclosure at the beginning of a program results in less disclosure memory compared to disclosure in the middle or at the end of a program. The duration of the disclosure does not appear to infl uence disclosure memory. Additionally, viewers’ program and disclosure familiarity increase the chance that a disclosure is remembered, while program involvement decreases disclosure memory. These results may be useful in the development of effective sponsorship disclosure, as they indicate several conditions under which disclosures are more likely to be remembered. 1. SPONSORSHIP DISCLOSURE AWARENESS 32 INTRODUCTION Television programs are increasingly integrating sponsored content into editorial content (Smit, Van Reijmersdal, & Neijens, 2009; Sung, de Gregorio, & Jung, 2009). This use of sponsored content ranges from the simple placement of a brand into a television program (i.e., brand placement) to programs in which the brand plays a key role in plotlines and the creative development (i.e., brand integration; Hudson & Hudson, 2006). The goal of such sponsored content is to give (subtle) exposure to brand names and to persuade in an unobtrusive manner (Avery & Ferraro, 2000). Research has indeed demonstrated that sponsored content can alter viewers’ attitudes, even if memory for the placement is low (Matthes, Schemer, & Wirth, 2007). This unobtrusiveness has been a cause of concern for policy makers, consumer organizations and academics. By blurring the boundaries between editorial and commercial content, viewers may not recognize sponsored program content as commercial because its source and intent are unclear (Nebenzahl & Jaffe, 1998). Therefore, it has been argued that sponsored content violates the right of consumers to know that a message is sponsored, and hence is unethical and deceptive (e.g., Cain, 2011; Kuhn, Hume, & Love, 2010; Nebenzahl & Jaffe, 1998). To avoid any confusion on the part of the viewer, the EU decided to make sponsorship disclosure on television obligatory (Audiovisual Media Services Directive, 2010). Similarly, in the US sponsorship regulations are being reconsidered (Cain, 2011; Federal Communications Commission, 2008). Although the application and use of sponsorship disclosure differ between countries, the purpose is always to explicitly inform the audience when commercial content is integrated into editorial content to guarantee fair communication and avoid persuasion without audience awareness (Cain, 2011; Woods, 2008). Despite the European regulations and American law-proposals, little scholarly research has been conducted on sponsorship disclosures on television. The few studies that did investigate this subject focused on the effects of disclosures on brand responses (i.e., brand memory and brand attitude) and different forms of persuasion knowledge (Boerman, Van Reijmersdal, & Neijens, 2012a, 2012b; Campbell, Mohr, & Verlegh, 2013; Van Reijmersdal, Tutaj, & Boerman, 2013). Remarkably, two of these studies found that a large number of participants did not recall the sponsorship disclosure (i.e., 52% in Boerman et al. [2012b] and 17% in Campbell et al. [2013]). Sponsorship disclosure aims to inform audiences so they can guard themselves and use their persuasion knowledge to cope with the persuasive attempt (Cain, 2011; Woods, 2008). Prior research emphasized the importance of sponsorship disclosure memory in achieving its goal of activating persuasion knowledge, as it showed that sponsorship disclosure only had an effect on persuasion knowledge when the viewer recalled seeing a disclosure (Boerman et al., 2012a). Hence, when sponsorship disclosure is not remembered, it most likely does not have its intended effect and may be futile. Despite the importance of disclosure memory, no research has looked into the antecedents of sponsorship disclosure memory. Therefore, this study takes one step back in the hierarchy of effects and aims to explore under which circumstances viewers remember sponsorship disclosure.