Use of "entertainment" chimpanzees in commercials distorts public perception regarding their conservation status.
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2011
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Abstract
Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) are often used in movies, commercials and print advertisements with the intention of eliciting a humorous response from audiences. The portrayal of chimpanzees in unnatural, human-like situations may have a negative effect on the public's understanding of their endangered status in the wild while making them appear as suitable pets. Alternatively, media content that elicits a positive emotional response toward chimpanzees may increase the public's commitment to chimpanzee conservation. To test these competing hypotheses, participants (n = 165) watched a series of commercials in an experiment framed as a marketing study. Imbedded within the same series of commercials was one of three chimpanzee videos. Participants either watched 1) a chimpanzee conservation commercial, 2) commercials containing "entertainment" chimpanzees or 3) control footage of the natural behavior of wild chimpanzees. Results from a post-viewing questionnaire reveal that participants who watched the conservation message understood that chimpanzees were endangered and unsuitable as pets at higher levels than those viewing the control footage. Meanwhile participants watching commercials with entertainment chimpanzees showed a decrease in understanding relative to those watching the control footage. In addition, when participants were given the opportunity to donate part of their earnings from the experiment to a conservation charity, donations were least frequent in the group watching commercials with entertainment chimpanzees. Control questions show that participants did not detect the purpose of the study. These results firmly support the hypothesis that use of entertainment chimpanzees in the popular media negatively distorts the public's perception and hinders chimpanzee conservation efforts.
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Schroepfer, Kara K, Alexandra G Rosati, Tanya Chartrand and Brian Hare (2011). Use of "entertainment" chimpanzees in commercials distorts public perception regarding their conservation status. PLoS One, 6(10). p. e26048. 10.1371/journal.pone.0026048 Retrieved from https://hdl.handle.net/10161/6941.
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Tanya L. Chartrand
Tanya Chartrand is the Roy J. Bostock Marketing Professor and Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at Duke University. Her research interests focus on the nonconscious processes influencing emotion, cognition, and behavior. Tanya has published in numerous psychology and consumer behavior journals, including American Psychologist, Psychological Science, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, Journal of Consumer Research, and the Journal of Consumer Psychology. She is on the editorial board of the Journal of Consumer Research, the Journal of Consumer Psychology, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, and Social Cognition. Tanya was a co-chair of the 2011 North American Association for Consumer Research Conference and was co-editor of a special issue of Journal of Consumer Psychology on Nonconscious Processes that appeared in 2011. She was also recently on the Executive Committee of the Society of Experimental Social Psychology, chairing the dissertation award, career trajectory award, and membership committees. She received her PhD from New York University in social psychology, and was on the psychology faculty at Ohio State University before joining Duke University. Tanya teaches Market Intelligence and Consumer Behavior to the MBAs, Social Cognition, Research Methods, and Automaticity to the PhDs, and Psychology of Consumers to the undergraduates at Duke.
Brian Hare
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