Raab, MaximilianMaximilianRaab0000-0001-9263-04292025-02-272025-02-272025https://fis.uni-bamberg.de/handle/uniba/106377Kumulative Dissertation, Otto-Friedrich-Universität Bamberg, 2024Knowing how to present a crowdfunding project, thus, which displayed cues facilitate funding decisions is important for entrepreneurs to increase funding, especially in reward-based crowdfunding. However, there is limited knowledge about the relationship between the display of affective cues through different communication modalities and funding performance. By systematically reviewing and synthesizing the reward-based crowdfunding literature, this dissertation provides a structured overview of the cues affecting funding performance. The literature review reveals several distinct cues for which the effects point in a clear direction, while for several other cues, the effects are less straightforward and require further investigation. The empirical results of this dissertation demonstrate that the social richness of a project presentation and the entrepreneur’s participation behavior affect funding success. Building on these findings, it is shown that the emotional appeal of the project presentation has a significant effect on the funding outcome. Particularly, affective words in text, affective speech in pitch videos, and facial emotional expressions in pictures and pitch videos have an inverted U-shaped, non-linear relationship with funding performance. Thus, moderate, instead of high numbers of affective cues lead to higher funding. Initial evidence is provided that the non-linear effect is influenced by social-contextual factors prevailing in reward-based crowdfunding. Showing how affective cues can be orchestrated and combined across different modalities to effectively impact funding performance introduces a novel multi-modal perspective. By employing a set of lenses theoretically grounded in social presence, emotional contagion, and emotion as social information, this dissertation helps to better understand the effects of affective cues on funding behavior. Overall, this cumulative dissertation offers theoretically grounded and empirically verified insights regarding the effects of affective cues on funding performance in reward-based crowdfunding. Thus, this dissertation serves as a guide for practitioners and scholars to understand and leverage the potential benefits of affective cues displayed on multi-modal, multi-sided platforms.engreward-based crowdfundingverbal and nonverbal affective cuesfunding decisionsdata-driven analysis330doctoralthesisurn:nbn:de:bvb:473-irb-1063773