Political Advertising in the Shadow of the Financial Crisis: the Use of Emotional Appeals in the Greek 2012 Election Campaign

As an illustrative example of a country facing the financial crisis, the study employs Greece as a case in point for the examination of emotional advertising messages aired during the 2012 election campaign. A sample of 88 television advertisements was content analysed, highlighting the widespread use of emotional advertising and the elicitation of negative emotions in particular, in an effort of the political parties to get the limelight of media and to attract the electorates’ attention. Variations of the emotional strategies employed were also recorded. In particular, pro memorandum parties were likely to instill fear while anti-memorandum parties preferred to evoke hope, warm heartedness and anger. Similarly, conservative parties glamorized the use of fear and pride appeals as opposed to liberal parties that promoted warm-heartedness appeals.