Designing Public Information Campaigns as an Effective Policy Tool: Construal-Level Fit Effects and Evidence from an Experimental Study

Applying the construal-level theory, this study compares two different recycling campaigns to analyze the effects of the interaction between social distance and message orientation on citizens’ (policy-takers) responses to public information campaign messages. The results of an experimental study show that messages focused on high-level (why-laden) features were more persuasive when the messages were framed in terms of socially distant entities (the planet/Earth), while messages focused on low-level (how-laden) features were more effective when asking participants to make judgments about their proximal entities (their country/local community). Policy implications for designing public information campaigns as a policy tool are discussed.