Huang co-author of best paper

Marketing Associate Professor Lei Huang from the School of Business presented papers recently about the application of social media, such as Twitter, for corporate social responsibility (CSR) marketing communications, at two international conferences.

The paper, “Understanding Consumer Sentiment: What this means for firms using CSR,” co-authored with Kristina Harrison from the University of Southern Mississippi, received the 2023 International Society of Marketing Spring Conference Best Paper Award in the Ethics, Social Responsibility and Sustainability Track. The conference was held at Hilton Head Island, S.C.

The second paper was presented at the virtual Research Innovations in Sustainable Marketing 2023 Symposium.

In the research, Dr. Huang and his collaborators examined how tweets evaluated based on tone (valence and character) coupled with the CSR type, Corporate Operating Performance (COP) vs. Corporate Social Performance (CSP), and the related CSR fraud can subsequently impact their CSR beliefs and confidence in the firm. CSR beliefs are the extent that an individual feels a firm should be engaging in CSR activities. Dr. Huang presented the findings of this research at the above two conferences: the valence of the tweets moderated by the tweet’s character or tone impacts the consumer’s belief in firms engaging in CSR activities. Tweet valence increases confidence in firms while tweet valence moderated by the fraud type (CSP fraud vs. COP fraud) decreases confidence in firms. Negative utilitarian tweets lead to less confidence in firms while positive utilitarian tweets lead to more confidence in firms, which can be explained through cognitive appraisal theory.