Beyond Emotional Appeal: How Brand Attitude and Consumer Involvement Shape Purchase Intention

Abstract

This study investigates the impact of emotional appeal of the advertising on purchase intent of consumers with the mediation of the brand attitude and the moderation of the consumer involvement. A moderated mediation model was developed and tested based on the Theory of Planned Behaviour, Elaboration Likelihood Model, and Hierarchy of Effects Model. A structured questionnaire was used to gather cross-sectional data from 320 marketing professionals of Punjab, Pakistan, which were analysed using partial least squares structural equation modelling (SmartPLS 4). Measurement model showed good reliability, convergent validity and discriminant validity. All five hypotheses were supported by the structural results. Emotional appeal had a significant positive effect on both brand attitude and purchase intention; brand attitude had a significant effect on purchase intention and mediated between emotional appeal and purchase intention, in part. Importantly, the role of emotional appeal on purchase intention was strongly seen in the low-involvement consumers and was statistically non-significant in the high-involvement consumers, suggesting a strong and negative moderation effect of consumer involvement. The present results provide an extension of the Elaboration Likelihood Model by showing that the persuasive impact of the peripheral cue emotional appeal is focused when involvement is low. The study provides brand managers with evidence-based advice for tuning emotional advertising at the audience level and adds to the scarce literature that exists on emotional advertising in the South Asian context.

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