The entire thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file; a non-technical public abstract appears in the public.pdf file. Title from PDF of title page (University of Missouri--Columbia, viewed on November 17, 2009). Thesis advisor: Dr. Yong Volz. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.S.)--West Virginia University, 2009. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains iii, 23 p. Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 21-23).

Thesis (M.A.) - Carleton University, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 113-120). Also available in electronic format on the Internet.

Previous studies on celebrity endorsement have focused on merits of the celebrity endorser as the key factors for predicting endorsement effectiveness. This research extends previous research by exploring the effects of the consumer's para-social interaction (PSI) with the celebrity. Based on the Source Credibility Model, the proposed model takes PSI as the core variable and examines its relationship with self-brand connection and ideal congruency. Two studies were conducted using online questionnaires to collect consumers' self-reported data. Study 1 tested a partial model using sports celebrities. Study 2 tested the full model using entertainment celebrities. Study 1 had 605 respondents and study 2 had 387 respondents. The respondents were young, well-educated and included both fans and no-fans of the selected celebrities. The results showed that consumer-celebrity PSI was an essential factor in the endorsement process. The perceived attractiveness of a celebrity was an antecedent to PSI, which in turn allowed the consumer to establish a personal connection with the endorsed brand and resulted in positive brand attitude. Furthermore, the results showed that consumers tend to have stronger PSI with a celebrity when they hold a higher degree of ideal congruity with the celebrity. Finally, results indicated that the context in which the celebrity was shown with the brand had significant effects, with a real-life context yielding stronger effects than an ad endorsement context or a product placement context. In sum, this research extended the source attractiveness model by clarifying the endorsement process to include consumer-celebrity PSI and brand-related responses. It also contributed to the audience-celebrity PSI theory. In addition, this research revealed the potential impact of celebrity-brand associations in real-life contexts on endorsement effectiveness, thus providing new insights for research related to the various forms of celebrity endorsement.

The creation of identity, a stable sense of one's self, is a major developmental process in adolescence (Erikson, 1950). Identity develops through the process of socialization and identification with other people, such as role models. Adolescents have a primary inclination to use media in socialization, and Arnett ( 1995),reasons that the familial sources of socialization start to diminish during adolescence. Although peers are a major contributor of identity formation, media personalities are also used in the development of identity (Arnett, 1995). The purpose of the present study was to examine adolescents' identity-socialization process through use of 'media-based personalities. A sample of three-hundred-and-one students between the ages of 11 and 21 were surveyed. The participants were administered a questionnaire packet including written instructions and questions pertaining to the individual’s demographics, and identification with media-based role models. The packet also included the following inventories: the Multidimensional Self-Esteem Inventory (O'Brien and Epstein, 1987), the Emotional Autonomy Scale (Steinberg and Silverberg, 1986), and the Extended Version: Objective Measure of Ego Identity Status (Adams and Grotevant, 1979). The results of the present study suggested that media role models do have a significant impact on identity development in adolescence. Younger adolescents did not differ from older adolescents in overall level of media role model identification, but the variation in level of identification was much smaller for younger than for older adolescents, indicating that older adolescents are more individuated in their attitudes toward role models. Significant correlation's were also found between how often one wears clothing and jewelry associated with media role models and personality variables, such as emotional autonomy and level of identity attainment. Level of Total identification with media role models stayed high and steady throughout all adolescent age ranges. This finding suggests that media role models are highly identified with by adolescents. Overall, this study purports that media role model identification is a healthy process in identity achievement.

University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences. / Department of Communication

No description available.

The purpose of this study was to analyze the cover images of Vanity Fair magazine from the years 1983 to 2008. The study attempted to determine if Vanity Fair’s covers have become more focused on celebrities over time and also analyzed how Vanity Fair defines a celebrity. The study used grounded theory from a case study perspective. An additional research question was to determine the number of politically-based cover images versus the number of celebrity-based cover images. This research used content analysis methodology. Both open and axial coding were used. Results were entered into Microsoft Excel and analyzed for statistical significance. / Department of Journalism

Many companies choose to use celebrities as endorsers for their advertising campaigns. The two most common types are athletes and entertainers. The purpose of this thesis is to gain a better understanding of how celebrities, especially professional golfers, are used as endorsers in advertising.

This dissertation focuses on the production and development of a conspicuous, widespread culture phenomenon in contemporary Japan, which is characterized by numerous young, mediapromoted personalities, or pop-idols, who are groomed for public consumption. The research, based on eighteen months of in-depth fieldwork in the Japanese entertainment industry, aims to contribute to the understanding of the allegorical role played by pop-idols in the creation of youth culture. Pop-idols are analyzed as personified symbols that function as vehicles of cultural production. The principal issues suggested in this research include: the criteria of popidol production; the ways in which pop-idols are produced; the perceptions of pop-idol performances by producers, performers, and consumers; the ways in which idol personalities are differentiated from each other; the ways in which pop-idol performances are distinguished from other styles or genres; and the social, cultural, political, economic, and historical roots as well as consequences of pop-idols' popularity. These issues are explored through the examination of female pop-idols. The single, most important function of pop-idols is to represent young people's fashions, customs, and lifestyles. To this end, the pop-idol industry generates a variety of styles that can provide the young audience with pathways toward appropriate adulthood. They do this within their power structure as well as their commercial interest to capitalize on adolescence - which in Japan is considered the period in which individuals are expected to explore themselves in the adult social world. The stylized promotion, practiced differently by promotion agencies that strive to merchandise pop-idol images and win public recognition, constitutes a field of symbolic contestation. The stage is thus set for an investigation of the strategies, techniques, and processes of adolescent identity formation as reified in the construction of idol personalities. This dissertation offers a contextualized account of dialogue that occurs between capitalism, particular rhetoric of self-making, and the lifestyle of consumers, mediated by pop-idols and their manufacturing agencies that function together as the cultural apparatus. The analysis developed in this dissertation hopes to provide theoretical and methodological contributions to the study of celebrities in other social, cultural, and historical settings.