CHINGCHING CHANG Self-Congruency as a Cue in Different Advertising-Processing Contexts

This study examines how self-congruent advertising messages affect ad and brand evaluations in different contexts. Within the Elaboration Likelihood Model, this study proposes that an ad message’s congruency with subjects’ self-concepts serves as a peripheral cue when subjects do not have the motiva-tion to process information. Experiment 1 shows that subjects rely on mes-sages ’ self-congruency in forming brand and ad attitudes in positive affective states, in which motivation to engage in message elaboration is low, whereas subjects in negative affective states do not. Moreover, in line with past evidence that the lack of motivation to process induced by positive affective states can be overridden by factors enhancing individuals ’ motivation, Experiment 2 dem-onstrates that when a product is high involving, as opposed to low involving, attitudes toward the product are less likely to be developed based on the mes-sages ’ self-congruency, even when subjects ’ affective states encourage a periph-eral mode of processing. Bombarded with a large quantity and variety of information every minute, individuals learn to process incoming information in selective ways. Self-concepts, being well-developed and salient cognitive structures, function readily as important reference frames when individuals engage in selective information processing (Markus, 1999). However, selective processing based on existing knowledge structures has been shown to be more likely to occur when an individual’s motivation or ability to process information is con-strained (Markus & Zajonc, 1985). In a similar vein, selectivity based on self-knowledge is more likely to happen when individuals ’ motivation to process information is low or when their cognitive capacity is limited. Part of the information load that people carry is directly related to the products avail-able on the market. Therefore, selective processing on the basis o