Online Behavioral Advertising: A Literature Review and Research Agenda

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Boerman, Sophie C., Kruikemeier, Sanne, Borgesius, Frederik J. Zuiderveen
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Boerman, Sophie C.
Kruikemeier, Sanne
Borgesius, Frederik J. Zuiderveen
author_facet Boerman, Sophie C.
Kruikemeier, Sanne
Borgesius, Frederik J. Zuiderveen
contents Advertisers are increasingly monitoring people's online behavior and using the information collected to show people individually targeted advertisements. This phenomenon is called online behavioral advertising (OBA). Although advertisers can benefit from OBA, the practice also raises concerns about privacy. Therefore, OBA has received much attention from advertisers, consumers, policymakers, and scholars. Despite this attention, there is neither a strong definition of OBA nor a clear accumulation of empirical findings. This article defines OBA and provides an overview of the empirical findings by developing a framework that identifies and integrates all factors that can explain consumer responses toward OBA. The framework suggests that the outcomes of OBA are dependent on advertiser-controlled factors (e.g., the level of personalization) and consumer-controlled factors (e.g., knowledge and perceptions about OBA and individual characteristics). The article also overviews the theoretical positioning of OBA by placing the theories that are used to explain consumers' responses to OBA in our framework. Finally, we develop a research agenda and discuss implications for policymakers and advertisers.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2511_01895
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Online Behavioral Advertising: A Literature Review and Research Agenda
Boerman, Sophie C.
Kruikemeier, Sanne
Borgesius, Frederik J. Zuiderveen
Computers and Society
Advertisers are increasingly monitoring people's online behavior and using the information collected to show people individually targeted advertisements. This phenomenon is called online behavioral advertising (OBA). Although advertisers can benefit from OBA, the practice also raises concerns about privacy. Therefore, OBA has received much attention from advertisers, consumers, policymakers, and scholars. Despite this attention, there is neither a strong definition of OBA nor a clear accumulation of empirical findings. This article defines OBA and provides an overview of the empirical findings by developing a framework that identifies and integrates all factors that can explain consumer responses toward OBA. The framework suggests that the outcomes of OBA are dependent on advertiser-controlled factors (e.g., the level of personalization) and consumer-controlled factors (e.g., knowledge and perceptions about OBA and individual characteristics). The article also overviews the theoretical positioning of OBA by placing the theories that are used to explain consumers' responses to OBA in our framework. Finally, we develop a research agenda and discuss implications for policymakers and advertisers.
title Online Behavioral Advertising: A Literature Review and Research Agenda
topic Computers and Society
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.01895