Advertising Morality: How Advertisers Think about the Social Good

• In Event: 160 - Section on Social Psychology Paper Session. Interconnections: Social Psychology and Cultural Sociology

Abstract

Advertising has long been stigmatized as complicit in exploitative capitalist mechanisms and cultural degradation. However, little is known about the ways in which those who work in advertising maintain a positive self-perception in face of such critique. In this paper, we analyze the ways advertisers frame the moral worth of their work. We draw on 9 total months of fieldwork and 74 interviews across three different advertising agencies in the United States. We employ identity theory on the one hand and pragmatic and cultural sociology on the other hand to identify the meaning structures by which advertising professionals discussed moral conduct in their field. We find that advertising practitioners use shared frames and narratives to present situation meanings in which their moral identities and the moral worth of their work are justified. Three such frames emerged in particular: the account-driven, which links moral virtue to caring for the client and for the advertised product; the creative-driven, which ties the social good to the production of inspiring advertisements; and the strategic-driven frame, which sees the social good in helping consumers and spreading civic values. Our findings suggest these frames are not ad-hoc, but instead consequential for those working in advertising. Based on this evidence we argue that professional communities maintain shared meaning structures by which to confirm workers’ sense of morality. Theoretically, the work unpacks the ways in which cultural meaning-structures facilitate social psychological identity work, and provide individuals with the tools to maintain a positive self-perception.

Authors

• Andrew C Cohen, Yale University

• Shai M. Dromi