[Testing the Influence of Message and Audience Factors on the Acceptance of Cardiovascular Disease Campaign]

The aim of the study is to analyze the factors of individuals and campaign messages to effectively prevent cardiovascular disease. We conducted an experiment with a young-aged group (in their 30s) and a middle-aged group (in their 50s) to test the effect of types of sources (celebrity vs. non-celebrity) and individuals' characteristics (same age with campaign model) on empathy. This study found that the middle-aged group tended to have higher empathy for sources compared to a young-aged group across all conditions, especially showed higher empathy for the condition with non-celebrity. Young-aged group showed lower empathy in general than the middle-aged group, but indicated higher empathy to the condition with a celebrity model in their age. Additionally, we also analyzed qualitative data to improve the quality of campaign messages. The data revealed that middle-aged people had favorable attitudes towards campaign messages, and prefer easy-to-understand messages and a non-celebrity model who they can identify with. Young-aged group indicated relatively unfavorable attitudes toward campaign messages. They wanted campaign messages to emphasize potential health risks and give them more specific guidelines to maintain health. We suggest the campaign message targeting the middle-aged group could use non-celebrity whereas that of the young-age group use celebrity in their age. The importance of "WHY & HOW" messages strategy for cardio-cerebrovascular disease prevention campaign was discussed.