Political Ads and Voter Decision Making: Effectiveness and Ethical Implications of Campaign Communication Strategies

The study examined political ads and voter decision specifically xraying the effectiveness and ethical implications of campaign communication strategies. The study was anchored on the agenda setting theory and the powerful effect theory. The study adopted the survey research design and the questionnaire as the instrument for data collection which was distributed to 399 respondents who were drawn from the population of 208,098 people in Asaba. The data collected from the respondents were presented in tables and analyzed using simple percentages. The study found among others that political ads are effective in influencing the voting decision of electorates to a great extent. It was also found that although political ads have an effective influence on the respondents’ voting decision, they are not passive recipients of media messages. This implies that they have the inalienable ability to sieve through the contents of political ads before making voting decisions. Based on the research findings and conclusion, it is recommended among other that political advertisers and campaign handlers learn to focus their campaigns on the candidate, the political party and their accomplishments and policies. Political ads should not be an attack tool or a means of pulling down the other candidate but should be used to propagate the reasons a candidate should be voted for. Sometimes, political advertisers make the mistake of presenting themselves as a lesser evil by exposing the weaknesses of the other party while entirely jettisoning their own pros.

Keywords: Politics, Political Ads, Voter Decision, Ethics, Campaign Communication.