Shepherd, StevenZaboli, Sahel2025-01-222025-01-222024-07https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14446/345840Big brands and companies understand the increasing importance of social issues, and people want to see their favorite brands care about and take a stand on social issues (Schumann, Hathcote, & West, 1991)However, when brands are active in the socio-political domain, their underlying motivations are increasingly examined by consumers (Holt, 2002). Signaling morality and one’s moral status may not always be received well by others, it could lead to Moral Grandstanding Perception which is using public moral discourse to achieve social status(Cramwinckel, van den Bos, & van Dijk, 2015; Tosi & Warmke, 2016). This research, using experimental method, proposes that when brand advocates for a social or political issue, they run the risk of engaging in moral grandstanding (MG) which can help explain the relationship between consumers’ adverse reactions to brand activism by showing that consumers perceive a brand’s moral stance not as sincere support but as a gesture for showing off.application/pdfCopyright is held by the author who has granted the Oklahoma State University Library the non-exclusive right to share this material in its institutional repository. Contact Digital Library Services at lib-dls@okstate.edu or 405-744-9161 for the permission policy on the use, reproduction or distribution of this material.Dissertationbrand activismmoral grandstanding