Consumer response to print advertisements containing culturally congruent and incongruent advertisements in Korea

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine the relative effectiveness of print advertisements containing culturally congruent and incongruent advertisements in Korea. This study used four different types of advertising appeals (individ ualism-collectivism, equalitarianism-authoritarianism, modernity-tradition, and materialism-humanism) and included culturally congruent and incongruent advertisements in Korea. One pair of advertisements containing culturally congruent and incongruent advertisements was produced for each of the experiment products. All experimental advertisements included only a headline and illustrations. A total of 98 participants were randomly assigned to experimental groups. The findings of the study showed that culturally relevant messages are not always more effective than culturally irrelevant messages. Among the four cultural value dimensions are studied, in only two dimensions, collectivismindividualism and humanism and materialism, were our hypotheses regarding advertising appeals supported. Our hypotheses regarding authoritarianism-equalitarianism and tradition-modernity dimensions were not supported. Moreover, the data showed that our hypothesis regarding the relative effectiveness of advertising appeals in authoritarianismequalitarianism dimension was supported in the opposite direction. The present study makes a contribution towards the understanding of the relationship between culture and advertising.