Uncharted Territory in Research on Environmental Advertising: Toward an Organizing Framework

Abstract

In light of increasing awareness of environmental issues, advertisers around the world have developed numerous campaigns to communicate environmentally friendly attributes. The aim of this article is to review the existing literature to identify research gaps and future directions. It is suggested that content analytical research should be expanded to audiovisual media and comparative research designs. Greater analytical precision is needed for the detection of greenwashing in advertising messages. Effects research is called to use more complex and especially audiovisual stimuli, employ behavioral measures, and examine long-term effects of environmental messages. To push the boundaries of environmental advertising research, this article suggests a novel organizing framework. Based on this framework, it is suggested to focus more on explaining advertising exposure as well as attention allocation. Also, the consideration of implicit attitudes as independent, dependent, and moderating variables marks a particularly pressing and promising avenue for future research.