About

Sela Sar is a professor in the Charles H. Sandage Department of Advertising at the College of Media. He holds a Ph.D. and M.A. in Mass Communication from the University of Minnesota. His teaching and research focus on affect, advertising, and consumer behavior. Sar has taught a variety of courses at both undergraduate and graduate levels, including Advertising Research Methods, Global Advertising, Audience Analysis and Media Planning, Foundations of Advertising, Quantitative Research Methods in Advertising, and other specialized seminars. His research interests center on affect and advertising, specifically examining mood, emotions, perceptions, memory, judgment, and decision-making related to social, risk, and health advertising. He investigates how people share emotional information and public health campaign messages online using affective computational approaches. His work aims to deepen the understanding of how mood and emotions interact with social advertising messages to influence attitudes and behaviors. Sar is a senior associate editor of the International Journal of Advertising and has held leadership roles such as Head of Advertising Division at AEJMC, President of the American Academy of Advertising, and Director of the Institute of Communications Research. His articles have been published in numerous academic journals, contributing significantly to the scholarship of advertising.

Research topics

• Political Science
• Computer Science
• Psychology
• Social psychology
• Artificial Intelligence
• Information Retrieval
• Advertising
• Economics
• Marketing
• Engineering
• Medicine
• Management
• Clinical psychology
• Communication
• Mathematics
• Business
• Cognitive psychology

Selected publications

• Infusing Affective Computing Models into Advertising Research on Emotions

  Journal of Advertising · 2024-10-19 · 7 citations

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Effects of Affect and Message Framing on Responses to Charity Advertising: A Construal Level and Regulatory Focus Perspective

  Communication Studies · 2023-10-13 · 1 citations

  article

  ABSTRACTCharitable donation appeals can be framed to highlight the attainment of desirable outcomes (promotion framing) or the avoidance of undesirable situations (prevention framing). Drawing from regulatory focus theory, construal level theory, and the linguistic categorization model, this study reveals how the impact of the two messages frames can be influenced by the emotional state of the message recipient. Participants had more favorable attitudes toward charity advertisements, were more likely to donate to a food bank, and placed more value on donating when charity ads highlighted desirable end-states, but only if they were in a positive mood. In a negative mood, participants responded better to charity ads that described how donations could be used to avoid undesirable situations. Analysis showed these effects might occur because people process information differently under the two mood conditions and the two message frames trigger different motivational mind-sets.KEYWORDS: Moodmessage framingcharity advertisingregulatory focus theorypromotion – preventionconstrual level theory Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Additional informationNotes on contributorsGeorge AnghelcevGeorge Anghelcev is Professor of Strategic Communication in the Journalism and Strategic Communication Department at Northwestern University in Qatar.Sela SarSela Sar is Professor of Advertising in the Charles H. Sandage Department of Advertising at University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.Yan HuangYan Huang is Assistant Professor of Integrated Strategic Communication in the Jack J. Valenti School of Communication at the University of Houston.

  PublisherDOI

• The Ideal Advertising Professor: A ZMET-Based Inquiry

  Journal of Current Issues & Research in Advertising · 2023-01-19 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access

  Advertising departments in universities worldwide must grapple with a fast-changing industry that continues to redefine itself amid technological change and disruption. It is a reality that has prompted extensive discussion among researchers, educators, administrators, and advertising practitioners. There have been workshops addressing the need to consider the skills and qualifications of the contemporary advertising professor. However, left out of the conversation are the students, and thus their expectations about their instructors remain largely unknown. How do students imagine the ideal advertising professor? What qualities are they looking for? What do they want to learn, and how do they envision their relationship with their advertising professors? We explored students’ mindset using the Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique (ZMET), obtaining rich insight into their thoughts, feelings, and expectations about the ideal advertising professor. The study can serve as a tool of reflection for advertising educators about their teaching practices, and of assessment for advertising departments during hiring and promotion.

  PublisherDOI

• Walk in my shoes: How perspective-taking and VR enhance telepresence and empathy in a public service announcement for people experiencing homelessness

  New Media & Society · 2022-08-16 · 27 citations

  articleSenior author

  This research explored how a virtual reality (VR) public service announcement (PSA) in a first-person perspective (vs non-VR PSA scripts: first-person perspective-taking, non-perspective-taking) impacted attitudes toward the PSA and attitudes toward people experiencing homelessness. Participants first reported their attitudes toward people experiencing homelessness. Seven days later, participants watched or read a PSA about the life of a person experiencing homelessness and reported their attitudes toward the people experiencing homelessness and the PSA. We explored how psychological processes (telepresence, empathy, reactance) related to persuasion. Results showed viewing or reading any of the PSAs led to more favorable attitudes toward the target group. The VR PSA was the most likely format to induce telepresence and empathy and the least likely to induce reactance. Attitudes toward the VR PSA were more positive than toward the script PSAs. Overall, our study provides insights into the effectiveness of VR and narrative formats for persuasion.

  PublisherDOI

• Intrusive or Relevant? Exploring How Consumers Avoid Native Facebook Ads through Decomposed Persuasion Knowledge

  Journal of Current Issues & Research in Advertising · 2021 · 30 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding
  • Computer Science
  • Psychology
  • Political Science

  This study investigates the mechanism underlying how consumers cope with native advertising on the Facebook newsfeed, particularly focusing on ad avoidance. Native ads on Facebook have unique features in that they are both intrusive and relevant to users. Study 1 (survey: N = 501) decomposed a persuasion knowledge construct into dispositional, conceptual, and attitudinal features to address how multidimensional constructs of persuasion knowledge are associated with ad avoidance in response to the intrusiveness and relevance of native advertising. Study 2 (experiment: N = 157) employed a 2 × 2 between-subject experimental design to examine causal relationships between the same variables. The results of both studies revealed that dispositional persuasion knowledge was more significant than situational factors in activating conceptual and attitudinal persuasion knowledge. Conceptual persuasion knowledge directly increased ad avoidance. Contrary to expectations, attitudes toward native ads did not play any intermediary role between persuasion knowledge and native ad avoidance. Implications are discussed.

  PublisherDOI

• Effects of Affect: How Mood and Arousal Influence Consumer Evaluation of Search Engine Result Page (SERP) Ad Snippets

  Journal of Interactive Advertising · 2021 · 6 citations

  • Computer Science
  • Information Retrieval
  • Computer Science

  An experiment was conducted with the goal of determining how mood and arousal influence the way consumers process ad information in a search engine result page (SERP) environment. By focusing on the relationships among mood, arousal, and search ad snippet length, the study shows that mood and arousal states influence information processing (heuristic vs. systematic) on search pages both independently and jointly. Using the heuristic-systematic model, the present research explains how information processing modes triggered by mood and amplified by arousal shape the processing and evaluations of search ads with different snippet lengths. Both theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

  PublisherDOI

• Marketing Processed Organic Foods: The Impact of Promotional Message Framing (Vice Vs. Virtue Advertising) on Perceptions of Healthfulness

  Journal of Food Products Marketing · 2020 · 22 citations

  • Political Science
  • Advertising
  • Marketing

  The study shows that the perceived healthfulness of processed organic foods, compared to their conventional counterparts, can be altered by slight variations in how promotional messages are framed. A sample of US organic shoppers (N = 375) was exposed to advertisements promoting processed organic (and processed conventional) foods by highlighting either virtue or vice aspects of the products. An interaction between the type of processed food (organic, non-organic) and the type of promotional message (vice, virtue) was observed. Processed organic foods were perceived as more healthful than non-organic equivalents only when advertisements emphasized vice-related aspects of the product. Following exposure to virtue-framed advertisements, organic and non-organic products were seen as equally healthful. The result was replicated conceptually using different vice and virtue products, rather than framing the same product as virtue and vice. The paper concludes by presenting theoretical, practical, and methodological implications of the design and reported findings.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Is heavy binge-watching a socially driven behaviour? Exploring differences between heavy, regular and non-binge-watchers

  Journal of Digital Media & Policy · 2020-11-24 · 26 citations

  article

  Results of an online survey suggest that heavy binge-watching of serialized video content might be in part socially motivated. Among a sample of US college students, heavy binge-watchers were more likely to be opinion leaders and to experience fear of missing out (FOMO) than regular binge-watchers or non-binge-watchers. They also reported higher levels of parasocial engagement with the shows’ characters than other viewers. Contrary to common beliefs, heavy binge-watching did not come at the cost of decreased social engagement. Quite the opposite: heavy binge-watchers reported spending significantly more time in interactions with friends and family on a daily basis than non-binge-watchers. Heavy binge-watching was also modestly associated with a few negative outcomes (loss of sleep and decrease in productivity).

  PublisherDOI

• Binge-Watching Serial Video Content: Exploring the Subjective Phenomenology of the Binge-Watching Experience

  Mass Communication & Society · 2020 · 47 citations

  • Psychology
  • Social psychology
  • Clinical psychology

  This study examined psychological constructs related to the subjective experience of binge-watching serial video content. The results underscore the centrality of transportation in shaping viewers’ perceptions of the binge-watching experience and their binge-watching behaviors. Transportation was positively related to binge-watching frequency and mediated the impact of binge-watching session length on development of parasocial interactions (full mediation) and on binge-watching enjoyment (partial mediation). Ability to experience flow was found to predict the length of a binge-watching session. Other significant relationships were revealed. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed, along with suggestions for future research and the possibility of expanding current conceptual views of binge-watching.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• The influence of mood and information processing strategies on recall, persuasion, and intention to get a flu vaccine

  Health Marketing Quarterly · 2019-01-02 · 11 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  This study investigates the interactions between mood (positive/negative) and information processing style (item-specific/relational/narrative processing) on responses to three types of advertising messages (ungrouped list/grouped list/narrative ads). A mood congruency effect was postulated and found to influence recall, persuasion and behavioral intention. Results supported the hypothesis that message effectiveness was moderated by mood in the direction of congruency. That is, participants in a positive mood recalled more information, were more persuaded, and were more likely to adopt the recommended behavior after exposure to advertisements with a grouped list format. Evidence regarding similarity of factors influencing relational and narrative processing is presented.

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• George Anghelcev

  Northwestern University in Qatar

  21 shared

• Jun Myers

  12 shared

• Lulu Rodriguez

  Iowa State University

  9 shared

• Xiaoli Nan

  University of Maryland, College Park

  7 shared

• Brittany R. L. Duff

  7 shared

• J Moultrie

  University of Washington

  4 shared

• Suman Lee

  University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

  4 shared

• Ron Faber

  University of Minnesota

  4 shared

Labs

• Charles H. Sandage Department of AdvertisingPI

Education

• Ph.D., Mass Communication

  University of Minnesota

• M.A., Mass Communication

  University of Minnesota

Awards & honors

• President of American Academy of Advertising (2022-2023)
• Head of Advertising Division at AEJMC (2014-2015)