New advertising professor Louvins Pierre centers research on social, psychological consumer factors

Louvins Pierre can trace his interest in advertising back to childhood. 

“As a kid, I often watched advertisements because I found them funny. In hindsight, it may have been my underlying interest in the advertising and how [it was] effective that caused me not to change the channel,” Pierre said. “One ad that comes to mind is Apple's original iPod commercial with music and dancing silhouettes, which directly influenced me to ask my parents to buy me one for either my birthday or Christmas. Another includes McDonald’s 2005 ad that used humor to communicate when you work hard for your money, you should spend it wisely on their value menu.”

Pierre will bring his long-time advertising interests and expertise to Illinois this fall as an assistant professor in the Charles H. Sandage Department of Advertising with an appointment in the Institute of Communications Research.

Pierre said the reputation of the Sandage Department of Advertising, and the many prominent scholars within, helped inform his research and drew him to pursue a position at Illinois.

“I am looking forward to working with and learning more about the work of others throughout the College of Media and the university,” he said. 

This fall, Pierre, who earned a BA in communication at Tuskegee University in Alabama, and an MA and PhD in communication at the University of Connecticut, will be teaching ADV 284: Consumer Insight, a class designed to teach students how to build a brand strategy that puts the desires and needs of the consumers first—a subject with which he’s very familiar. 

Pierre’s dissertation examined how consumer evaluations of advertising about two similar, yet different, social issues, “Black Lives Matter” and “Stop AAPI Hate” could vary. 

Using both an in-person laboratory experiment with Gen Z consumers—who are believed to highly value brand activism—and a follow-up online experiment with older consumers from the general population, Pierre explored whether consumers evaluate advertising about these social issues differently; what multimedia components of the advertisement affect consumer evaluations; and what internal factors influence consumer evaluations.

One of his key insights included “evidence that when you visually feature people who are adversely affected by the movement, it can improve consumer evaluations of the ad.” He also found that brand authenticity mattered, and ads that facilitated a sense of transportation or immersion were viewed more positively. Learn more about Pierre’s research.

Pierre is equally passionate about the research process and his teaching, and he considers the opportunity to make an impact on students amongst the most fulfilling aspects of a career in academia. 

“It is humbling and rewarding to know I helped [former students] gain either some practical experience as a research assistant or conceptual knowledge in the classroom. I look forward to being able to continue these efforts and more with the talented students at Illinois,” he said. 

Pierre says his teaching objectives are to guide students to understand the “why” behind advertising before showing them how they may apply concepts, and he aims to make the classroom experience interactive and relevant. 

He also encourages students to share their interests and career goals, which helps him to make adjustments to lectures and classroom activities to meet students’ needs. 

At Illinois, Pierre will continue his research on how brands influence consumer decision-making through advertising, with a focus on the social and psychological consumer factors.

Some of his potential projects include studying how consumer attitudes and knowledge about new technologies that more precisely target them (AI, algorithms, machine learning, etc.) relate to their consumption decision-making. 

For now, he’s most looking forward to working with fellow thought leaders in the Sandage Department of Advertising, as well as the students.

“The advertising department is well known nationally and internationally as a major outlet for advertising research,” Pierre said. “Being in an environment filled with bright and motivated students and faculty will be a truly rewarding opportunity.”

—Kelly Youngblood