50 years of research on international standardization and adaptation—From a systematic literature analysis to a theoretical framework

Recently, social media have emerged as key marketing communication channels. In this context, consumers are increasingly gathering in online communities which have been identified as social-media-b...

Exploring the Antecedents of Brand Loyalty and Electronic Word of Mouth in Social-Media-Based Brand Communities: Do Gender Differences Matter?

Purpose 
 
 
 
– Sex appeal has been widely used in most countries. However, little is known about consumers' responses to sex appeal advertising in different cultures. The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of sex appeal on ad and brand evaluation among Australian, Chinese and US consumers. 
 
 
 
 
Design/methodology/approach 
 
 
 
– The paper adopted a three (Australia, China and the USA) × two (male or female model) × two (low or high level of sex appeal) between‐group factorial design. 
 
 
 
 
Findings 
 
 
 
– Australian, Chinese and US consumers have significantly different attitudes when exposed to the same ad. However, consumer buying intentions towards the advertised brand are not significantly different. Despite the general assumption that Chinese consumers might react least favourably to sex appeal ads, this paper finds that they hold similar attitudes towards sex appeal ads as US consumers and even more favourable attitudes than Australian consumers. Product involvement is found to be a significant covariate. 
 
 
 
 
Research limitations/implications 
 
 
 
– The sample includes young consumers, who may be more tolerant to sex appeal advertising than older generations in China. A similar situation may exist in Australia and the USA. 
 
 
 
 
Practical implications 
 
 
 
– Understanding how consumers in different cultures respond to different advertising appeal strategies is important for international advertisers. 
 
 
 
 
Originality/value 
 
 
 
– This is the first reported empirical study that compares Chinese consumers' responses to sex appeal advertising with those in Western countries. Findings add to the understanding of the standardisation‐localisation debate.

Consumer responses to sex appeal advertising: A cross-cultural study of Australia, China and the United States

Localization in China: How guanxi moderates Sino–US business relationships ☆

To test the belief that feminism and sexualization of women in advertising stand in opposition, this study employed a large US national sample (N = 1298) to examine how consumers’ feminist attitudes differentiate and predict their ethical judgment and ad-related evaluations of sexual images of women in advertisements. The results indicate that (1) consumers with higher feminist attitudes evaluated sexual ads more favorably than those having lower feminist attitudes, and (2) consumers’ feminist attitudes positively predict ad-related evaluations with full mediation of ethical judgment. These findings, which diverge from previous research, may indicate that contemporary feminists view sexual images of women differently than in previous decades. Theoretical and practical implications are described.

Do feminists still respond negatively to female nudity in advertising? Investigating the influence of feminist attitudes on reactions to sexual appeals

While the use of sex appeal is on the rise in China to advertise products ranging from beer to cars, their effect on Chinese consumers is largely unknown and may be incongruent with the Chinese culture. This study adopts the congruency theory to examine the effects of sex appeal in international advertising and proposes several testable hypotheses. In an experiment, we adopt a three × two design including three levels of sex appeal and two models (Chinese and Caucasian) and test the advertisements with a group of Chinese consumers. The results suggest that the subjects respond more favourably to advertisements with non-sex appeal than those using sex appeal in terms of their attitudes toward the advertisement (A ad ) and brand (A b ), and buying intention (BI). Chinese consumers also prefer advertisements featuring Chinese models to those using Caucasian models, even when strong sex appeal is used. Thus, international advertisers are cautioned with standardized strategies in advertising to Chines...

Responses of Chinese consumers to sex appeals in international advertising : a test of congruency theory

This study investigates the effect of culturally incongruent messages in international advertising on consumer responses. The results of an experiment suggest that the type of cultural values (terminal vs instrumental) and ethnic background of models (foreign vs local) significantly moderate the effect of message congruency on attitude towards the advertisement, and such effect is mediated by the number of counter-arguments. Thus, culturally incongruent messages can be effective if they avoid conflict on a fundamental value or are positioned as originating from a foreign culture. Moreover, model background moderates the effect of message congruency on brand attitude and buying intention. These findings have meaningful implications for international marketing across societies of different cultural traditions.

Culturally incongruent messages in international advertising

Existing literature suggests that people's cognitive styles vary significantly across nations and cultures, and that East Asians emphasize holistic information processing and are more receptive to transformational advertising than people in the West. Yet, both theoretical rationale and empirical evidence of the effect of cognitive style on consumers' advertising responses are lacking. This study proposes a congruency-activation model and adopts a three by two experimental design to examine Chinese consumers' attitude towards different advertisements. The results indicate that Chinese consumers prefer transformational and integrated ads to informational ads under both low and high involvement conditions. Protocol analysis shows that Chinese consumers engage in more affective processing than cognitive thoughts. Thus, marketers should consider the effect of the cognitive style of indigenous consumers when devising international advertising strategies.

Xiaoyan Yang

Papers

Responses of Chinese consumers to sex appeals in international advertising : a test of congruency theory

Culturally incongruent messages in international advertising

Culture, cognitive style and consumer response to informational vs. transformational advertising among East Asians: Evidence from the PRC