The current study reveals that a corporate statement on a controversial social issue is effective in changing an individual’s attitude toward the issue depending on how much the issue is relevant to the individual’s goals and/or if the corporate statement is supported by other corporations. Advocacy fit, corporate credibility, the bandwagon heuristic, and position advocated were varied in a fully crossed 2 × 2 × 2 × 2 experiment ( N = 677). The relevance of the controversial social issue to each participant’s goals and values was also considered. Findings indicate that the fit of an issue mattered for attitude change when the issue was relevant to one’s goals. The number of corporations that agreed with the corporate statement affected attitude change when the issue was relevant to each participant’s goals and values. Corporate credibility did not have any significant effect on whether individuals changed their attitudes. Implications and directions for future research are discussed.

This study compared the corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication of multinational corporations (MNCs) and small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) within the petroleum industry operating in a defined geographic region. We analyzed the CSR reports of 33 petroleum refining companies (13 MNCs, 20 SMEs) to identify which CSR practices and people are institutionalized within the petroleum refining industrial field’s CSR communication and the differences of CSR communication between MNCs and SMEs. We found that CSR associated with environmental, health and safety, and philanthropy practices that benefit employees and communities were institutionalized across the field. However, MNCs and SMEs differed on the primacy given to particular practices and people. In addition, a small set of unique CSR practices and people were identified within each sector. We describe the implications of this research for CSR communication, institutional theory, and business sector research.

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