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Despite the prominent use of sexual appeals in advertising, little is known about how consumers process messages that contain explicit versus implicit sexual appeals. This research presents the results of two studies that tested whether product type and individual consumer differences in sensation seeking moderated the effects of sexual appeal type. In Study 1, we conducted an experiment and found that an explicit sexual appeal was more effective in promoting a sexually related product, while an implicit sexual appeal was more effective in promoting a non-sexually related product. The above-mentioned results only held for high sensation-seeking participants, not for those who are low sensation seekers. In Study 2, we used a different manipulation of product type and replicated the results. The findings underscore how important it is for marketers to learn more about how different sexual appeals work. The findings also illuminate how practitioners can avoid negative consumer reactions to a sexual appeal.
