Mechanisms of Child Abuse Public Service Announcement Effectiveness: Roles of Emotional Response and Perceived Effectiveness

This study tests the processes through which child abuse public service announcements (PSAs) are effective. The proposed model builds upon the persuasion mediation model of Dillard and Peck (2000 Dillard, J. P. and Peck, E. 2000. Affect and persuasion: Emotional responses to public service announcements. Communication Research, 27: 461–495. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), which integrates emotional response and perceived effectiveness as antecedents of issue attitudes and behavioral intention. The model tested the mediating role of perceived effectiveness in the persuasion process. Multigroup structural equation modeling was performed for three different types of child abuse prevention PSAs shown on YouTube to 486 college students. The model was well fitted across all three child abuse PSAs. Emotional response seems to exert the largest influence on behavioral intention directly and indirectly through perceived effectiveness and issue attitudes. In addition, perceived effectiveness has both a direct and an indirect impact on behavioral intention.