Search results

This paper aims to explore the effectiveness of ethnically targeted ads in developing consumer–brand relationships through an application of social identification theory and elaboration likelihood model among African American consumers in the service sector.

Study 1 used a 2 (service type: hedonic vs utilitarian) × 2 (strength of ethnic identification: high vs low) between-subjects experimental design. Study 2 used the same experimental design, procedure and ads as Study 1.

Taken together, the findings from these two studies demonstrate how ethnically targeted advertising, in conjunction with service type, can influence consumer–brand relationships. The results showed that those with high strength of ethnic identification had more brand love, as well as higher intentions to spread positive word-of-mouth, purchase intention and brand loyalty for hedonic services, but that this effect was not significant for utilitarian services.

The environments in which advertisements appear (e.g. in an in-store display or a magazine advertisement) is important, and consumers’ reactions to targeted ads in various environments should be considered in future research. Future studies should also examine the role of individuals’ personality traits and level of acculturation in determining their relationships with brands.

Across two studies, the authors demonstrated that ethnic ads are more effective for African American individuals with high level of ethnic identification especially for hedonic services.

The purpose of this study is to explore the acculturation caused by the Korean wave among Indonesian Muslim consumers, especially in the food and cosmetic sectors, based on religious grounds.

Data were collected through focus group interviews with 20 Muslim respondents in Indonesia.

The findings specifically highlighted that Muslim consumers’ acceptance of Korean products varied. Muslim consumers’ acceptance was influenced by similarities and differences in values between Islamic and Korean cultures. Consumers categorised into each acculturation mode (assimilation, separation, integration and marginalisation) showed different behavioural patterns in Korean product acceptance. This study proposes that global products can be optimised through specific and targeted marketing campaigns for different types of Muslim consumers with products that comply with their religious values.

Few studies have explored the importance of religious values (e.g. righteousness, compassion and respect for others) with respect to the acceptance of foreign products in the acculturation context. Additionally, how values from other cultures reconcile with the Indonesian Muslims’ affinity for Korean culture has been limitedly studied. This study aims to fill these gaps by identifying the role of religious factors in the acceptance of global products by taking the example of Indonesian Muslim consumers and Korean products.

This study aims to examine differences in the perceived value of luxury as drivers of luxury purchase intentions between individualist and collectivist cultures (at a country level) and consumers of Muslim versus Christian religious backgrounds. Moreover, this study investigates how consumers’ acculturation to the global consumer culture (AGCC) impacts their perceived luxury values.

The authors conducted two online survey studies. The first study compares Muslim consumers in Kuwait versus Muslims consumers in the UK. The second study compares the UK Muslim sample to a UK Christian sample. The authors collected data from 600 and 601 respondents, respectively. Partial least square structural equation modeling was used to test this study’s research hypotheses.

The perceived personal values of luxury primarily drive consumers’ luxury purchase intentions. The hedonic value of luxury impacts luxury purchase intentions significantly more for Muslims in the UK than in Kuwait. No significant differences were observed between religions. Consumers’ AGCC exerts a positive impact on all included perceived luxury values and more strongly impacts perceived uniqueness for Muslims than for Christians.

The paper builds on an integrative luxury values framework to examine the impact of luxury values on consumers’ purchasing intentions by studying the moderating effect of culture and religion on these relationships. The study is partly set in Kuwait, an understudied country, and investigates a Muslim minority in the UK.

This study investigates the role of consumer cosmopolitanism on consumer attitudes and purchase intentions (PIs) towards foreign and local brands.

The responses were collected on a structured questionnaire through a consumer survey. The data were then analysed through structural equation modelling (SEM).

The results depict the positive influence of consumer cosmopolitanism on consumer attitudes towards foreign brands, which positively influences PIs towards foreign brands and negatively influences the PIs of local brands. Further, the mediating role of perceived quality was observed in explaining the consumer preference towards foreign and domestic brands.

Finally, the study concludes by providing implications for marketing scholars and managers of global and local brands.

The paper examines the underlying mechanisms related to consumer cosmopolitanism and its role in influencing the foreign and local brand purchase.

This study aims to focus on the dynamics in influencer-consumer relationships to understand how Generation Z consumers’ identification and social comparison with influencers shape their response to influencers’ branded posts. Specifically, this study investigates how perceived similarity and wishful identification lead to distinct social comparison mechanisms that affect Generation Z consumers’ self-improvement motives, which, in turn, drive their message engagement, brand attitudes and purchase intentions.

An online survey was conducted with 295 college students who are digital natives and whose purchase decisions are heavily influenced by social media influencers.

The study findings confirmed that perceived similarity positively influenced assimilative comparison emotions of optimism, admiration and aspiration while negatively influenced contrastive comparison emotions of envy, depression and resentment. Wishful identification positively affected both assimilative and contrastive comparison emotions. Both types of social comparison emotions further affected consumers’ motivations to follow the influencer for self-improvement, thereby enhancing their brand attitude, purchase intention and engagement behaviors.

This study is one of the earliest attempts to investigate the relationship dynamics between influencers and consumers from the lens of social comparison. The study examines the antecedents of perceived similarity and wishful identification, the mediators of upward comparison emotions and self-improvement motives and the brand evaluation outcomes of message engagement, brand attitude and purchase intention.

This study aims to analyze the extent to which the walking tour in virtual version appeals to the younger generation and still provides lessons about cultural acculturation that can inspire citizenship today compared to an actual walking tour.

This quasi-experimental design uses pre-test and post-test with structured interviews for data collection from five purposive participants who related the experience and storytelling that they experienced from the tours.

This study finds while virtual tours cannot replace physical walking tours because of real multisensory experiences, storytelling and guiding interpretation through virtual tours is more likeable than walking tours Due to some potential disturbance in the field. However, the guiding interpretation related to the message of multiculturalism still reaches tourists both through actual and virtual tours.

This study has limitations regarding the number of participants. A larger number of participants may provide greater objectivity. In addition, regarding the quasi-experimental method used, it is possible to have different results if the actual walking tour precedes the virtual tour, and this can be a broad discussion space for future researchers.

Practically, this walking tour is expected to be a model for civic education, especially in Indonesia, which is delivered in a fun way through a walking tour.

This study offers a novelty regarding the development of a walking tour based on citizenship education, which can be seen from its impact on the younger generation when it is held virtually or actually.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the extent to which cultural differences and slogan meaning type affect the role of comprehension in attitude toward the ad (A_ad) and attitude toward the brand (A_brand) formation.

In an online experiment, a total of 256 adult participants from the USA (ranged in age from 19 to 26 years old) and 184 participants from France (ranged in age from 18 to 28) were randomly assigned to one of the two conditions (slogan: single meaning vs polysemous) in a between-subjects experimental design. After getting exposed to the ad, participants responded to questions related to their A_ad, A_brand, comprehension, uncertainty avoidance and demographics.

Results from this research demonstrate the moderating effect of uncertainty avoidance and slogan type (single meaning vs polysemous) on the relationship between comprehension and A_ad. The authors show that for polysemous (and not single meaning) slogans, comprehension results in more favorable A_ad for low uncertainty avoidance individuals than for high uncertainty avoidance individuals. In addition, the authors demonstrate the mediating effect of A_ad in the relationship between comprehension and A_brand.

The authors used nationality as a proxy for culture. Future research should include other cultural dimensions in the development of conceptual models and analysis of data. Another limitation is that the authors used a college student sample for this research. A more representative sample should be used in future research to examine cultural differences in interpreting adverting messages. One other limitation concerns the measurement tool the authors used to measure objective versus subjective comprehension in this research. While the theoretical foundations of the two modes of comprehension are clear and robust, improved measurement tools can enhance the validity and reliability of future research. Finally, the authors suggest that future research examine the effect of such variables as figure-ground contrast, figure attractiveness, stimulus repetition, prototypicality, symmetry and semantic or visual priming that may impact the processing of brand slogans.

This study argues that the processing of brand slogans in advertising is impacted by culture. Individuals from different cultures perceive and comprehend brand slogans differently. This study contributes to the research stream that examines the influence of cultural dimensions on the effectiveness of advertising by focusing more precisely on the impact of uncertainty avoidance (one of Hofstede’s cultural dimensions). In the case of single meaning slogans, advertisers might diminish the use of objective comprehension advertising strategies to influence both individuals with high and low uncertainty avoidance. In the case of polysemous slogans, advertisers should consider that consumers with high uncertainty avoidance (vs low uncertainty avoidance) are impacted more by subjective comprehension (vs objective comprehension) when forming A_ad and A_brand.

This research contributes meaningfully to the marketing literature by examining previous work on ad slogan processing through subjective vs objective comprehension and extending the analysis by incorporating culture as an important factor.

This study aims to propose and test a research model outlining the chain effects of social media marketing activities (SMMA) on brand equity, encompassing the potential mediators of self-congruity, consumer empowerment and brand experience.

An online survey was conducted, and 241 valid responses were acquired. The data was submitted to Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM), complemented by the artificial neural network (ANN) analysis.

The results revealed that SMMA can foster the development of self-congruity and consumer empowerment. These two psychological responses represent the key drivers to reinforce the positive brand experience and ultimately lead to brand equity. The sequential mediating effect was confirmed. The ANN analysis offered further insights into the ranking of variable importance.

The present study presents a breakthrough by taking into account the roles of self-congruity, consumer empowerment, brand experience simultaneously and assesses their sequential mediating roles in the linkage between SMMA and brand equity.

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused severe challenges to ethnic minorities in the UK. While the experiences of migrants are both complex and varied depending on individuals' social class, race, cultural proximity to the host country and acculturation levels, more in-depth studies are necessary to fully understand how COVID-19 affects specific migrant groups and their health. Taiwanese migrants were selected because they are an understudied group. Also, there were widespread differences in pandemic management between the UK and Taiwan, making this group an ideal case for understanding how their acculturation journey can be disrupted by a crisis.

Qualitative data were collected at two different time points, at the start of the UK pandemic (March/April 2020) and six months on (October/November 2020), to explore migrant coping experiences over time. Theoretically, the authors apply acculturation theory through the lens of coping, while discussing health-consumption practices, as empirical evidence.

Before the outbreak of the pandemic, participants worked hard to achieve high levels of integration in the UK. The pandemic changed this; participants faced unexpected changes in the UK’s sociocultural structures. They were forced to exercise the layered and complex “coping with coping” in a hostile host environment that signalled their new marginalised status. They faced impossible choices, from catching a life-threatening disease to being seen as overly cautious. Such experience, over time, challenged their integration to the host country, resulting in a loss of faith in the UK’s health system, consequently increasing separation from the host culture and society.

It is important to note that the Taiwanese sample recruited through Facebook community groups is biased and has a high level of homogeneity. These participants were well-integrated, middle-class migrants who were highly educated, relatively resourceful and active on social media. More studies are needed to fully understand the impact on well-being and acculturation of migrants from different cultural, contextual and social backgrounds. This being the case, the authors can speculate that migrants with less resource are likely to have found the pandemic experience even more challenging. More studies are needed to fully understand migrant experience from different backgrounds.

Public health policymakers are advised to dedicate more resources to understand migrants' experiences in the host country. In particular, this paper has shown how separation, especially if embraced temporarily, is not necessarily a negative outcome to be corrected with specific policies. It can be strategically adopted by migrants as a way of defending their health and well-being from an increasingly hostile environment. Migrants' home country experience provides vicarious learning opportunities to acquire good practices. Their voices should be encouraged rather than in favour of a surprising orthodox and rather singular approach in the discussion of public health management.

The paper has clear public health policy implications. Firstly, public health policymakers are advised to dedicate more resources to understand migrants' experiences in the host country. Acknowledging migrants' voice is a critical first step to contribute to the development of a fair and inclusive society. Secondly, to retain skilful migrants and avoid a future brain-drain, policymakers are advised to advance existing infrastructure to provide more incentives to support and retain migrant talents in the post-pandemic recovery phase.

This paper reveals how a group of previously well-integrated migrants had to exercise “coping with coping” during the COVID crisis. This experience, over time, challenged their integration to the host country, resulting in a loss of faith in the UK’s health system, consequently increasing separation from the host culture and society. It contributes to the understanding of acculturation by showing how a such crisis can significantly disrupt migrants' acculturation journey, challenging them to re-acculturate and reconsider their identity stance. It shows how separation was indeed a good option for migrants for protecting their well-being from a newly hostile host environment.