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APPEALING TO VALUES IN ADVERTISING ACROSS CULTURES:

RESULTS FROM A DISTORTED MIRROR

Nancy D. Albers-Miller, University of North Texas

ABSTRACT

This paper examines the reflective quality of

advertising across eleven countries and four product
categories using Pollay's 42 advertising appeals. The
results suggest some advertising appeals are commonly
used across countries and product categories, however,
the use of most advertising appeals is heavily
dependent on both culture and product category.

INTRODUCTION

In the area of advertising, a lively debate has existed

over the reflective quality of advertising (Holbrook
1987: Pollay 1986, 1987). As early as 1953 scholars
suggested that written communication is reflective of
values and cultural norms (Abrams 1953). Much of the
cross-cultural research in advertising has embraced
this idea, using content analysis to test for between-
country differences in cultural values and information
content portrayed in cross national advertising (di
Benedetto, Tarnate, and Chandran 1992; Hong,
Muderrisoglu, and Zinkhan 1987; Mueller 1992; Rice and
Lu 1988; Tansey, Hyman, and Zinkhan 1990; Tse, Belk,
and Zhou 1989; Weinberger and Spotts 1989; Zandpour,
Chang, and Catalano 1992).

Arguments have been made that advertisements both

reflect and influence cultural values. Many have
argued and agreed that advertisements have a reflective
quality (Courtney and Whipple 1983; Holbrook 1987;
McLeod and Kunita 1994; Pollay and Gallagher 1990;
Unwin 1974). McLuhan (1964) stated that "...the ads of
our time are the richest and faithful daily reflections
that any society ever made of its entire range of
activities. Holbrook (1987, p. 100) stated that
"...most advertising appears to mirror or reflect
rather than mold or shape the values of its target
audience." McCracken (1987, p. 122) explained that
advertising is the "conduit through which meanings are
constantly transferred from the culturally constituted
world to the consumer good."

A strong argument has been made that the "mirror" is

distorted (Pollay and Gallagher 1990). The values

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reflected in advertisements are only those that

reinforce the sellers best interest (Pollay and
Gallagher 1990). In other words, advertisements
reflect on a selective basis (Pollay 1986).
Advertisers use values in their advertising to increase
a product's importance to the consumer. Advertisers
select those communication messages to which consumers
respond most reliably. Therefore, some cultural values
will be reinforced through advertising more frequently
that others (Pollay 1986).

Cross-cultural researchers have argued that effective

advertising communication "...must appeal to values
that are salient in the culture of its intended
audience" (Belk, Bryce, and Pollay 1985, p. 11).
Advertisements will be interpreted "according to
cultural conventions" (McCracken 1987, p. 122). This
suggests that the most commonly used appeals, the ones
most frequently reinforced, will vary across cultures.

In addition to a cultural element, arguments can be

made that effective communication is also a function of
product category. Because different products have
different benefits associated with them, variation in
appeals might also be attributed to product category.
Therefore, some researchers have suggested that the
appeals that are reflected in advertising's mirror are
in part dependent on product category (Holbrook 1987).
Consequently, researchers have found differences in
advertising content based on the product category
(Caillat and Mueller 1996; Cutler and Javalgi 1992;
Madden, Caballero, and Matsukubol986; Rice and Lu 1988;
Tse, Belk, and Zhou 1989; Weinberger and Spotts 1989;
Zandpour, Chang, and Catalano 1992).

Advertisements communicate values through advertising

appeals. For example, an advertising appeal, such as a
claim that a product is prestigious, may evoke the
belief in a consumer that the product will confer
status on the person using it. The desire for status
derives from a value for social recognition. So which
advertising appeals are used most frequently by
advertisers to encourage consumer response? Are there
values that are consistent used most frequently? Is
the frequency of use dependent on culture? Is the
frequency of use dependent on product category?
Unfortunately, very little research has examined these
questions on a large scale.

Recently, some researchers in a cross-cultural context

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have begun to examine dominant values portrayed in

advertising. Cheng (1994) analyzed Chinese ads for
dominant themes and identified modernality, technology
and quality as predominant. Cheng and Schweitzer
(1996) compared Chinese ads to US ads and reported some
similarities and some differences. The objective of
this research is to shed some additional light on the
crosscultural reflections from advertising's mirror.

RESEARCH QUESTIONS AND METHOD

Specifically, this research explores three

propositions. First, some appeals to values will be
used extensively in advertising regardless of culture.
Second, culture will influence the degree to which some
appeals are used. Finally, product category will be
related to the use of advertising appeals. To test
these propositions, it was necessary to have an
extensive list of advertising appeals and to have a
wide range of culturally diverse sources of data.
Pollay (1983) developed an exhaustive category scheme
of all the common advertising appeals which resulted in
a categorization of 42 appeals which were used for this
study.

The content of print advertisements was analyzed for

the appeals they contained. The ads included in this
study were from nationally circulated general business
publications from eleven countries. Chile, Brazil,
Taiwan, Japan, India, Israel, Mexico, United States,
France, Finland and South Africa were selected for
cultural and geographic diversity (Hofstede 1980).
Business publications were selected because they have a
clearly defined target audience; hence, the
advertisements printed in the publications were
targeted for a relatively homogenous audience. The
advertisements in this study were limited to four
product categories, selected because they were the
categories most consistently advertised across all the
countries. They were office equipment, financial
services, clothing and travel services. Up to 50
advertisements per product category were included. In
total 1807 advertisements were included in this study.
The advertisements were coded in the language of the
publication. Two to three coders, native speakers who
were raised in the culture of the country, were hired.
Each of the appeals was coded as a dichotomous
judgment: the appeal is used in the ad or it is not.
The coders were trained using uniform instructions.
These instructions were both read aloud and provided in

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writing to each coder to minimize any influence by the

researcher. Because of the weaknesses associated with
interceder agreement (Kolbe and Burnett 1991),
interceder reliability was measured using Perreault and
Leigh's (1989) index of reliability. The interceder
reliability was very high ranging from 0.772 to 0.976.

RESULTS (Note: Due to technical restrictions, tables

with relevant data could not be included.)

In total, 210 cross-tabulation tables were computed.

Five tables were computed for each of the 42 appeals to
analyze for between-country differences by using chi-
square tests. Each chi-square test was a 2 X 11
comparison (the appeal was used or not used in the
eleven countries). The first set examined all appeals
used, regardless of product category. The next four
sets examined each product category independently.

The results suggest support for all three propositions.

Some appeals to values were used extensively in
advertising across cultures. Specifically, appeals to
effectiveness, convenience and distinctiveness were
commonly used. Effectiveness appeals were used in
55.56% of all 1807 ads across the eleven countries.
Convenience appeals appeared in 45.10% of the ads and
appeals to distinctiveness were used in 37.19%.
Conversely, some appeals were almost never used. Ten
of the 42 appeals were used in less than five percent
of the advertisements. Appeals to frailty (3.49%),
humility (3.27%), magic (2.10%), maturity (4.76%),
untamed (3.71%), casualness (3.60%), sexuality (4.15%),
nuturance (3.43%), succorance (2.99%) and family
(3.82%) were rarely used.

This said, culture remains an important variable in the

selection of effective selling tools. This study also
found strong support for the second proposition.
Culture does influence the degree to which some appeals
are used. All 42 chi-square tests for between-country
differences were significant at the 0.01 level. Even
appeals that were dominate, varied in use by culture.
While the effectiveness appeal appeared in 55.56% of
the ads overall, it was heavily used in Israel (97.00%
of all Israeli ads) and less commonly used in France
(23.84% of the French ads). Similarly, convenience
appeals appeared in 67.91% of the Finnish ads, but in
only 23.81% of the Brazilian ads. Conversely, while
the appeal to frailty was not used in any of the
Israeli or US ads, it appeared in 29.80% of the Chilean

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ads. Similarly, the appeal to humility did not appear

in any of the Japanese, French, Brazilian, Mexican or
US ads, but was included in 26.12% of the Finnish ads.

Finally, this study also found support that appeal use

varied by product category. In the clothing and
accessory category, the most heavily used appeals were
effective (37.86%), ornamental (37.57%), dear (35.55%),
distinctive (54.34%), vain (47.11%), and status
(39.60%). Five of the appeals were rarely used in
clothing and accessories advertising. Advertisements
rarely claimed that their products were cheap (3.18%),
humble (3.18%), magical (2.02%), nurturing (2.60%), or
family-oriented (2.89%). Again, strong support was
indicated for variation in use across cultures. All 42
chi-square tests for variation in use of appeals in the
clothing and accessory ads were significant, most (40
of the 42) at the 0.01 level. Wide variation in use
was observed by country. For example, nurturance was
not used in any of the ads from South Africa, France,
Finland, Mexico or the US, but appeared in 28.57% of
the Israeli ads. While the effectiveness ad was not
used in any of the Israeli clothing and accessory ads,
it appeared in 85.00% of the Chilean ads.

Similar to clothing ads, financial service advertising

used some appeals to a greater extent than others. The
effectiveness (60.84%), convenience (53.01%), wisdom
(42.37%) and safety (39.36%) appeals were most likely
to be used in ads for financial services. The healthy
(2.81%), frailty (1.61%), magic (0.40%), youth (2.81%),
untamed (1.41%), casual (1.41%), sexuality (0.40%),
and succorance (2.81%) appeals rarely appeared in
financial services advertising. Again, appeal use
varied culturally; of the 42 chi-squares examined, 37
were significant. The effectiveness appeal appeared in
100% of the Israeli and Finnish financial services ads,
but in only 20.42% of the French. Appeals to wisdom
were used in 90.91% of the Finnish ads, but in only
6.00% of the Brazilian ads. Safety themes were used in
100% of the Finnish ads, but in only 2.00% of the
Japanese ads.

Appeal use in travel services advertising also varied.

Most commonly, travel advertisements used appeals to
effectiveness (43.14%), convenience (49.56%),
distinctiveness (41.37%), relaxation (42.04%) and to
enjoyment (33.85%). Rarely used were appeals to frailty
(3.98%), modesty (4.87%), humility (3.76%), maturity
(3.76%), youth (4.20%), morality (3.76%), casualness

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(3.32%), sexuality (2.65%), nurturance (3.32%) or to

succorance (2.62%). As with other product categories,
appeal use varied by country (40 of the 42 appeals were
used in a significantly different way). Effectiveness
appeals appeared in 100% of the Israeli travel ads,
but in only 4.00% of the Taiwanese. Relaxation appeals
were used in 85.11% of the Finnish ads, but in only
5.71% of the Brazilian. While appeals to frailty were
not observed in any of the Japanese, Israeli, French,
Brazilian, Mexican or US ads, they were used in 34.29%
of the Chilean ads.

Finally, dominant appeals were observed in the office

equipment category. In this category, the appeals to
effectiveness (73.39%), convenience (58.71%),
distinctiveness (30.33%), modern (47.75%),
technological (63.80%) and productivity (40.31%) were
most commonly used. Appeals to traditional (4.31%),
healthy (0.59%), dear (0.98%), vanity (1.96%), frailty
(1.96%), natural (3.91%), humility (1.37%), magic
(1.17%), maturity (0.98%), youth (2.15%), untamed
(0.78%), relaxation (3.52%), enjoyment (2.54%), casual
(2.54%), sexuality (0.39%), nurturance (1.57%),
succorance (0.98%), or family (1.96%) were uncommon in
office equipment advertising. Across countries, appeal
use varied for this category as well. Of the 42 chi-
squares for office equipment 37 were statistically
significant. Technological appeals were used in 90.00%
of the French ads, but appeared in only 26.00% of the
Japanese. Productivity appeals were coded in 90.00% of
the Indian ads, but in only 6.00% of the Brazilian.

CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE RESEARCH

Support of the first proposition, that some appeals to

values are used extensively in advertising regardless
of culture, suggests that advertising's mirror is
distorted, even across cultures. It appears that some
selling premises are particularly strong, such as
effectiveness and convenience. These appeals are more
likely to be effective across cultures.

On the other hand, even though some appeals are most

commonly used across countries, cultural salience of
values appears to play an important role in the use of
advertising appeals. All 42 appeals varied
significantly in use across the eleven countries
studied here. If conventional wisdom is correct that
advertisers use the appeals that bring the best
results, the obvious conclusion is that different

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appeals perform better in different cultures.

Finally, the appeals which are expected to be the most

effective will also vary by product category. Not
surprisingly, appeals to enjoyment and relaxation are
more commonly used to advertise travel services than to
advertise office equipment. Less obvious are the
observations that durability is more commonly used to
sell clothing than to sell office equipment, that
popularity is used most in selling financial services
and least in selling clothing, or that affiliation is a
more important selling tool for financial services than
for travel.

A limitation of this study is a result of the

restriction to magazines targeted to business and
professional readers. While this study relied on the
homogeneity of audience to control for external
variables, other than culture, clearly, some appeals
might be less likely to be used for this target
audience. For example, sexuality appeals were rarely
used (4.15%) in these advertisements, but would
probably be more commonly utilized in adult magazines.
Future research should broaden this study to examine a
wider range of target audiences.

Additionally, future research should include additional

product categories. This study strongly suggests that
appeal use is dependent on product category.
Examination of additional product categories will
provide insight for advertising practitioners.

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Caillat, Zahna and Barbara Mueller (1996), "The

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Weinberger, Marc G. and Harlan E. Spotts (1989), "Humor

in U.S. versus U.K. TV Commercials: A Comparison,"
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*Due to technical restrictions, tables 1 through 5

could not be included. Tables may be obtained by
contacting the author.

Nancy Albers-Miller
Marketing Department
University of North Texas
P.O. Box 311396
236 BUSI, 321 Ave. A
Denton, Tx 76203
(940) 565-2645
albers@cobaf.unt.edu

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