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PurposeThis study examines how congruent moral conviction between an individual and a company impacts organization-public relationships (OPR). Using arguments from the Attribution Theory, this study also examines how individuals' perceptions of company motives impact the quality of the OPR. This study offers new understanding of what drives individuals' supporting behaviors regarding a company's advocacy efforts and how individual and company ethics contribute to OPR.Design/methodology/approachThis study conducts an online survey (N = 267) to examine the role of moral conviction as a predictor of OPR in the context of corporate social advocacy (CSA). Four types of attributions are examined as a mediating variable.FindingsResults indicate that moral congruency between an individual and an organization directly leads to stronger trust and power balance and that moral conviction positively predicts all four OPR dimensions through values-driven attributions.Originality/valueThis study is novel in its inclusion of the moral conviction variable examined in a CSA context, as the role of ethics, or ethical applications, has not been widely examined in this body of literature.

Purpose The dissemination of fake news has accelerated with social media and this has important implications for both organizations and their stakeholders alike. Hence, the purpose of this study is to shed light on the effectiveness of the crisis response strategies of denial and attack in addressing rumors about consumer privacy when non-profit organizations are targeted on social media. Design/methodology/approach To test the hypotheses, a 2 (response type: denial vs attack) × 2 (privacy concerns: low vs high), between-group online experiment was conducted via Qualtrics. Findings The results indicated that one’s involvement level in the issue determines the effectiveness of the crisis response strategy. Data showed that attacking the source of fake news (as a crisis response) reduces the message’s credibility more than denying fake news. Furthermore, highly involved individuals are more likely to centrally process information and develop positive supportive intentions toward the affected non-profit brand. High issue involvement also predicted organizational and response credibility. Conversely, an attack rebuttal message increased the credibility of the circulated malicious rumors for low involved individuals. Research limitations/implications The findings suggest that issue involvement plays a key role in message perceptions of false information regarding consumer privacy in social media. Practical implications Practically, this study offers insights for organizations that are developing response strategies in the current environment of fake news. Findings from this study suggest that organizations need to consider the degree to which audiences are currently involved in an issue before deciding how aggressively to respond to perpetrators of fake news. Originality/value The present study examines the intersection of fake news and crisis management in the non-profit sector, with an emphasis on various response strategies and issue involvement. This is one of the first attempts to experimentally investigate how social media strategies can defend and protect non-profit reputation in the fake news era.

PurposeSponsored social media content is one of the advertising strategies that companies implement so that ads appear as native to the delivery platform without making consumers feel that they are directly targeted. Hence, the current study examines whether prominently featuring corporate information on social media ads affects how consumers perceive them. It also investigates whether an ad's evaluation metrics on Twitter (e.g. number of likes/comments) influence its persuasiveness and consumers' behavioral intentions towards the sponsoring company. Underlying cognitive and affective mechanisms through which sponsored content operates are also investigated.Design/methodology/approachA 2 (corporate credibility: low vs high) by 2 (bandwagon cues: low vs high) between-subjects experiment was conducted.FindingsThe findings showed that corporate credibility and bandwagon cues can influence social media ad effectiveness. Sponsored content from high-credibility companies – evoked more favorable attitudes and behavioral intentions – is perceived as less intrusive, and elicits less anger than equivalent posts from low-credibility companies. Furthermore, it was found that bandwagon cues work via different pathways. For high-credibility corporations, a high number of bandwagon cues improved ad persuasiveness by mitigating consumers' anger towards intrusive sponsored content. Conversely, for low-credibility corporations high bandwagon cues enhanced ad persuasiveness, and this triggered more positive attitudes towards it.Originality/valueThis paper is the first to test corporate credibility and bandwagon effects in social media ads, while also exploring consumers' cognitive and affective responses to sponsored content. Implications for how companies with varying popularity levels should promote products on social media are discussed.

PurposeThis study examines why publics support corporate social advocacy (CSA) by looking at their support as a form of collective action that is motivated by individuals' shared group efficacy, anger and politicized identity by applying the Social Identity Model of Collective Action (SIMCA).Design/methodology/approachThis study adopted an online survey (N = 273), sampling US adults who supported a company's CSA effort.FindingsThe survey found that shared group efficacy with the company led to higher intention to participate in CSA, engaging in positive word of mouth (PWOM) and providing financial support for the CSA cause. Individuals' identification with the company and the CSA cause also predicted intention to support CSA and PWOM. Sharing CSA cause-related anger with the company negatively predicted PWOM.Originality/valueThis study is original as it investigated why and how people support for a company's CSA initiative by applying the SIMCA model. It extends the applicability of the SIMCA model to explain support for CSA. Moreover, this study enriches our theoretical understanding of CSA as it provides implications for why publics support CSA and how corporations can play a central role in gaining publics' support while taking stances on controversial issues.

PurposeThis study examines the stakeholder’s experiences of two key groups: donors and donor-volunteers. The goals of this study are to (1) determine how donor experience affects organization–public relationships (OPRs) and its antecedents for these two groups and (2) extend the OPR model by considering new potential supportive behavioral intentions arising from OPR outcomes.Design/methodology/approachUsing data from a survey of self-identified donors and donor-volunteers, multiple regressions were performed to establish the possible effects of experience and advocacy on OPRs.FindingsFindings of this study support the idea that donation experience can be considered a potential antecedent for the OPR. The findings also support the idea that advocacy can be a valuable behavioral outcome resulting from OPR.Practical implicationsNonprofits are ever seeking to better connect with their donor and volunteer supporters. This study helps to show the value of donation experience and the importance of cultivating advocacy behaviors among these supporters.Originality/valueThe study seeks to merge extant theory in communications and public policy to better understand the OPR model. Specifically, connecting OPR to the antecedent of donor experience and behavioral intentions like advocacy will help paint a stronger picture of donor–volunteer relationships with nonprofits.

Current research on nonprofit organizations (NPOs) indicates that interactive and engaging communication on social media platforms is preferrable to unidirectional communication. To gauge adherence to this notion among leading NPO communications, the current study incorporated big data, message features, sentiment analysis (SA), and social-media diffusion measures to examine the Twitter/X posts ( N  = 487,547) of the Forbes’ America’s Top 100 Charities in the US over a period spanning eight years. Results indicated that unidirectional strategies were much more common than engaging or dialogic strategies, although the latter two types of messages led to significantly higher positive sentiment and significantly lower negative sentiment within the message. Interactive features (media and hashtags) were included in most Tweets, and these features also led to greater positive sentiment. Interestingly, negative sentiment also was slightly but significantly correlated with greater diffusion on social media.

The foreign-born population has been an understudied population in public relations research. Foreign-born residents contribute to organizations through providing resource, donating and volunteering. Foreign-born volunteerism brings both benefits to nonprofit organizations as well as to foreign-born people themselves. This study focused on foreign-born Chinese volunteers, and investigated the roles of acculturation and organization inclusion strategies in organization-volunteer relationship (OPR), bonding and bridging change of social capital and future volunteer intent among foreign-born volunteers. The study surveyed 329 (N = 329) first generation foreign-born Chinese volunteers in the U.S. Results highlighted both the organizational and personal benefits of engaging foreign-born Chinese volunteers. From an organizational perspective, commitment dimension of OPR and positive bonding and bridging experience positively predicted future volunteer intent. From a personal perspective, feeling included in organizations facilitated the bonding and bridging experience for foreign-born Chinese volunteers. Acculturation showed positive impact on inclusion and bridging change of social capital. This study contributes to nonprofit public relations by making one of the first attempts to investigate an understudied population in public relations research and by integrating theories in volunteerism, intercultural communication and diversity management into public relations research. This study extends the application of OPR and enhances our understanding of nonprofit relationship maintenance when facing foreign-born Chinese volunteers. Practically, this study sheds light on how nonprofit organizations can better maintain relationships with diverse volunteer groups and contribute to social inclusion by engaging foreign-born volunteers. Practitioners should emphasize the organizations’ commitment to the volunteers and ensure healthy interpersonal relationships within organizations. It is crucial for organizations to create inclusive working environments as well.

China, as well as the rest of the world, is enthusiastically involved in the trend of integrating social media in every aspect of people’s lives. Online BBS, blogs, Renren (the equivalent of facebook), Tencent and Weibo are gradually becoming essential parts of people’s daily activities. It is reported that about 54.7 percent of Chinese Internet users own or visit blogs, and 47.3 percent of Internet users in China have at least one account on a social networking site (Fenn, 2011). Over 25 percent post more than 10 pieces of information on social networks everyday, and 92.3 percent of Chinese Internet users claim that they visit social networking pages at least three times a week. In addition, according to the Statistic Report on the Internet Development in China released in January 2012, among the 500 million Internet users in China, half of them own a microblog account, and the participation rate in microblogs has increased by 34.9 percent in 2011 as compared to 2010.

CircRNAs (circular RNA) are reported to regulate onset and progress multiple cancers. Nonetheless, the function along with the underlying mechanisms of circRNAs in HER‐2‐positive breast cancer (BC) remains unclear. CircRNA microarrays were performed to elucidate expression profiles of HER‐2‐positive BC cells. circRNA levels were quantified using qRT‐PCR assay. Various in vitro along with in vivo assays were employed to further explore the effects of circGFRA1 in the progress of HER‐2‐positive BC and interactions of circGFRA1, miR‐1228 and AIFM2 in Her‐2‐positive BC. CircGFRA1 was remarkably upregulated in HER‐2‐positive BC. Knockdown of circGFRA1 could attenuate HER‐2‐positive BC progression by inhibiting the proliferation, infiltration and migratory ability of HER‐2‐positive BC cells. Through ceRNA mechanism, circGFRA1 could bind to miR‐1228 and alleviate inhibitory activity of miR‐1228 on targeted gene AIFM2. In summary, circGFRA1‐miR‐1228‐AIFM2 axis regulates HER‐2‐positive BC. CircGFRA1 is a novel promising treatment option for HER‐2‐positive BC.

It was unclear whether breast cancer subtypes are associated with the risk of site-specific metastases. This study aimed to evaluate the relationship between molecular subtypes and distant metastatic sites and their prognostic significance. We identified 295,213 patients with invasive breast cancer from 2010 to 2014 using the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results database. Subtypes were classified into four categories: hormone receptor (HR )/human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2 ), HR /HER2 , HR /HER2 , and triple-negative (HR /HER2 ). Logistic regression was used to assess the association between metastasis location and subtypes. Multivariate Cox models were used to estimate the overall survival (OS) of related factors. According to our study, 3.28%, 1.52%, 1.20%, and 0.35% of newly diagnosed breast cancers presented bone, lung, liver, and brain metastases at diagnosis, respectively. Both metastatic sites and subtypes significantly affected the OS after metastasis. In multivariate analysis, HR /HER2 subtype (OR as compared with HR /HER2 subtype, 1.30 [95% CI, 1.22-1.39]) significantly correlated with elevated bone metastasis risk, whereas HR /HER2 did not. Both HER2 subtypes (HR /HER2 and HR /HER2 ) were significantly associated with higher rates of liver, brain, and lung metastases, while the highest OR was observed in liver metastases. Triple-negative tumors had a higher rate of brain (OR, 1.95 [95% CI, 1.61-2.35]), liver (OR, 1.35 [95% CI, 1.20-1.51]), and lung metastases (OR, 1.34 [95% CI, 1.21-1.47]), but a significantly lower rate of bone metastases (OR, 0.64 [95% CI, 0.59-0.69]) than HR /HER2-tumors. Breast cancer subtypes are associated with different metastatic patterns and confer different prognostic impacts. Molecular subtypes can identify patients at increased risk of site-specific metastases.