Exploring the Interest in Marketing Communication Ethics: Perspectives of Future Romanian Marketing Professionals
摘要
Theoreticians and practitioners have intensively debated the topic of ethics in business and marketing. Still, they have not concluded regarding the importance of unethical practices’ perception, neither for the consumers nor marketing professionals. This paper aims mainly to find the level of interest in marketing communications ethics, with implications on the brand attitude, from the perspective of future marketing professionals. The contribution of the research to the detangling of the complicated web of ethical principles and business interests is based on the double perspective approach: the marketing students, both as consumers and as future marketing professionals. For data collection, quantitative research was conducted, the respondents being master’s degree students in marketing studies. The results revealed some important insights, as follows: ethics is associated to a high extent with values such as morality, responsibility, and integrity; the most often perceived unethical practices are incorrect labeling, discrimination messages, and missing information; the prevalence of unethical issues depending on communication techniques, especially online advertising, price reductions, label, and packaging. The research results are useful from managerial and academic perspectives, contributing to a better understanding of ethicality in marketing communication and the consequences of its non-compliance.