The effect of cause scope and cultural values on brand evaluations: The mediating role of moral elevation

Globalization has led brands to become increasingly involved in transnational philanthropy, a behavior that affects brand attitudes and sustainable management. Cause scope (transnational vs. national) is a key attribute of philanthropy; however, research on the relationship between it and consumers' brand evaluations remains underexplored. This paper analyzes the impacts of brands' philanthropic cause scope and consumers' cultural values on brand evaluations. It also investigates the mediating role of moral elevation and the moderating role of corporate internationalization degree to suggest strategies for brand managers. Three experiments (Studies 1-3) and one survey (Study 4) were conducted to test the proposed effects. Studies 1-3 manipulated cultural values via priming tasks to situationally activate cultural orientation, whereas Study 4 measured these values as stable individual differences without priming. All data were collected from Chinese participants given that transnational philanthropy is on the rise in China. Results show that consumers with guanxi-oriented cultural values evaluate a brand conducting transnational philanthropy less positively than one conducting national philanthropy; consumers with rules-oriented values display the opposite tendency. Moral elevation was found to mediate the effects of cause scope and cultural values on brand evaluations. In addition, guanxi-oriented consumers' less favorable evaluations of brands engaging in transnational philanthropy are attenuated when brands' strategies involve a high degree of corporate internationalization. These findings enrich the theory of corporate social responsibility, expand research on cultural values and moral psychology, and offer managerial insights for improving brand evaluations and sustainable management.