Attracting Young People to Social Vocations: The Role of Happiness Benefit and Endorser Type in Vocational School Teacher Advertising
(A2025-126415)

AUTHORS

Bastian Blomberg, University of Wuppertal; Tobias Langner, University of Wuppertal; Daniel Bruns, University of Wuppertal

ABSTRACT

Demographic change is causing a vast shortage of young talents in social vocations such as teachers. Research on persuasive factors of vocational advertising is still missing. A qualitative study highlights that life happiness and endorsements by teachers and students play key roles in pursuing a career as vocational school teacher. A field experiment involving Instagram ads with over 880,000 impressions and corresponding landing pages assesses click-through rates reflecting vocational interest. Results show that endorsements by professionals (vs. students) are more persuasive for both pleasure and meaning benefits, with pleasure benefits endorsed by professionals far exceeding any other combination. Two follow-up studies suggest that the higher credibility of professionals (vs. students) makes them crucial for conveying unexpected benefits to increase vocational interest. However, for expected benefits, student endorsers do not perform substantially worse than professionals.