BÄYond Reality: Marketing in the Age of Deepfakes - A quantitative study on emotional engagement, perceived authenticity, and trust in deepfake advertising

Abstract

This paper investigates consumer responses to AI-generated content in advertising, with a particular focus on deepfake technology. While such content is increasingly used in digital marketing, limited empirical research has addressed its impact on consumer perception and behavior. To address this gap, an experimental design was employed in which participants were exposed to three types of advertisements, each created specifically for this study: a genuine deepfake created using AI, a pseudo-deepfake (a traditional advertisement falsely labeled as AI-generated), and a traditional advertisement. Participants’ responses were then evaluated across key factors such as emotion, authenticity, trust and purchase intention to determine how each type of advertisement influenced them. The results revealed that while deepfake advertisements did not significantly reduce emotional engagement or perceived authenticity, they were significantly less trusted than traditional advertisements. Trust emerged as the most critically affected factor, posing a key challenge for the broader acceptance of deepfake advertising. Emotions, especially enjoyment and anger, significantly predicted purchase intentions, particularly in the deepfake and pseudo conditions. This finding highlights the importance of emotional resonance in influencing consumer decisions. Additionally, while high realism positively influenced purchase intentions, it did not enhance other consumer responses to the same extent. Overall, despite the differences not being significant, both deepfake conditions had lower purchase intentions compared to the traditional condition, suggesting that AI-generated advertising is yet to reach the same level as traditional advertisements in engaging consumers. The study contributes to the expanding research on AI-generated content by offering empirical insights into how realism, authenticity, trust, and emotions interact in shaping consumer behavior. For practitioners, the findings suggest that deepfake advertisement must prioritize trust-building and emotional impact, as realism alone is insufficient to guarantee effectiveness. Finally, recommendations for future research include qualitative investigations to better understand consumer attitudes toward synthetic media and the exploration of real-word performance data to validate experimental findings.