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LA INFLUENCIA DE LA CULTURA EN LA PUBLICIDAD EMOCIONAL EN EL PER

El presente trabajo pretende indagar en la efectividad que tiene tomar en cuenta la cultura del pas en la aplicacin de lapublicidad tanto de productos como de servicios, pues tiene como objetivo analizar el papel de las dimensiones culturales,segn las clasifica Hofstede, de la evitacin de la incertidumbre y el individualismo/colectivismo, sobre el uso de tipos dehumor diferentes en la publicidad impresa, entre pases culturalmente diversos, especficamente una comparacin entrePer y Chile.

IntroduccinEl humor es uno de los recursos ms utilizados en la publicidad mundial emocionales, pero slo unos pocos estudiosdescriptivos han examinado las formas en las que vara entre las culturas nacionales. La mayora de estos estudios se hanpreocupado principalmente por la publicidad en televisin, aunque la mayora de los experimentos en el campo de lapublicidad humorstica han analizado publicidad impresa. Por otra parte, se han centrado en el uso operativo de losanuncios de buen humor, empleando principalmente la tipologa tcnica de Kelly y de Salomn (juego de palabras,eufemismo, broma, stira absurda, y la irona). Sin embargo, esta tipologa no proporciona una base estable para lacreacin de estrategia publicitaria, ya que no reconoce algunas motivaciones individuales para la creacin e interpretacinde humor 1 (en particular, los motivos sentimentales). Adems, no puede revelar cmo los anunciantes utilizan recursoshumorsticos para lograr sus objetivos de comunicacin en pases culturalmente diversos. Por lo tanto, el objetivo delpresente estudio es para llenar este vaco mediante la investigacin del uso del humor en la publicidad impresainternacional, y dar luz no slo sobre las motivaciones, sino tambin de las intenciones comunicativas de los anunciantes.

A nivel de cliente, una corriente de investigacin en el campo de la publicidad ha destacado el papel de procesos cognitivos,afectivos e interpersonales en la generacin y la interpretacin de humo r 2. Cada proceso nos da informacin sobrediferentes aspectos de las motivaciones de una persona que llevan a la creacin de humor y slo juntos son capaces deproporcionar una explicacin total para el uso de l3. La combinacin de los tres procesos, cognitivos, afectivos einterpersonales, conduce a cinco tipos de humor: el ingenio cmico, el humor sentimental, la stira, la comedia sentimentaly la comedia llena, proporcionando un punto ms de partida conceptual para el examen del humor en un contextotranscultural4. Sin embargo, a la fecha, el uso de los diferentes tipos humor en los anuncios de pases de diversidad culturalno se ha explorado.

El presente estudio est basado en el estudio realizado por la escuela de negocios de Harvard en el cual se tomaron comomuestra de anlisis del contenido de 7337 anuncios impresos del Reino Unido; y 5.014 griegos y, extrapolando losresultados a un mbito ms nacional, pretende proporcionar un anlisis comparativo sobre el uso de los cinco tipos dehumor es las ilustraciones de la publicidad impresa en un pas individualista como Chile y colectivista como Per. El estudiotambin se centra en la relacin intencional de identifica los tipos de humor especfico que se utilizan por los anunciantes yasea para entretener (dominantes humor-anuncios) o a informar al pblico objetivo (dominantes avisos con informacin) opara enfatizar la imagen de marca (Dominantes anuncios grficos). Relacin intencional se refiere a las intencionesprimarias de los anunciantes para el contenido humorstico, verbal o visual de los anuncios5, y puede proporcionar unavisin de las estrategias creativas utilizadas en diferentes culturas. La presente investigacin examina cmo las diferenciasen los valores culturales (evitacin de la incertidumbre e individualismo/colectivismo) podra afectar tanto a las motivacionesde los anunciantes como al pblico objetivo de los dos pases, utilizando la teora de Hofstede de culturas internacionales.

2. Marco terico

2.1 Humor in international advertisingContemporary international market places bring about the need for global campaigns and cross-cultural approaches.However, a few studies appear to have analyzed the global use of humorous advertising (Alden et al., 1993) (Table I).Content analysis seems to be the most frequently employed methodology in these research papers (Koudelova andWhitelock, 2001; Toncar, 2001; Hanna et al., 1994; Alden et al., 1993; Alden and Martin, 1995; McCullough and Taylor,1993; Biswas et al., 1992; Weinberger and Spotts, 1989), while experimental and quasi experimental designs (Lee andLim, 2008; Nevo et al., 2001; De Pelsmacker and Geuens, 1998; Unger, 1995) have been rarely used.Kelly and Solomons typology (pun, understatement, joke, ludicrous, satire and irony) (1975) has been employed as the mainmethodological instrument in descriptive studies (Table I). A synthesis of findings across papers provides evidence on theglobal pervasiveness of ludicrousness (Toncar, 2001; Alden and Martin, 1995; Alden et al. 1993; Hanna et al., 1994;Weinberger and Spotts, 1989). However, some exceptions do exist. For instance, Koudelova and Whitelock (2001) indicated

the prevalence of jokes in UK and Czech TV advertising, while Biswas et al. (1992) found high percentages of puns in USAand of jokes in France. This lack of consensus may be due to the operational nature of Kelly and Solomons typology (1975)that recognizes neither the individual motivations in humor nor the mechanisms that interpret these motivations. Psychologyresearch indicated three groups of mechanisms, namely cognitive, affective and interpersonal that determine the humor

1 Speck, 1987, p. 199

2 Lee y Lim, 2008

3 Lynch, 2002

4 Speck, 1991

5 Speck, 1991

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processing and humor appreciation (Beard, 2008; Shabbir and Thwaites, 2007; Lynch, 2002; Cho, 1995; McGhee, 1974).Despite attempts to provide a general theory of humor (Veatch, 1998; Morreall, 1983; Feinberg, 1978), it seems that it is theparallel use of the three humor conceptions that provides a more comprehensive interpretation of this individualphenomenon (Gulas and Weinberger, 2006; Lynch, 2002). However, advertising researchers have concentrated mainly oncognitive (Alden and Martin, 1995; Alden and Hoyer, 1993; Alden et al., 1993) and affective mechanisms (Lee and Lim,2008). Only McCullough and Taylor (1993) have tried to account for the three mechanisms that generate humor in an cross-cultural advertising context, based on Freuds (1905) theory of wit (nonsense, sexual and aggressive humor). They did not find statistically significant differences by type of humor among different cultures due to the small sample size (the USA, the

UK and Germany).

2.2 Specks humorous message taxonomy

Specks (1991, 1987) humorous message taxonomy is the only humor typo logy that links cognitive, affective andinterpersonal mechanisms with advertisers communication intentions. To date, there are only five research papers thatemploy elements of this taxonomy confined in the USA (Beard, 2008; Spotts et al., 1997; Speck, 1991), the UK (Shabbir andThwaites, 2007) and in China (Lee and Lim, 2008). Only two studies; Speck (1991) and Spotts et al. (1997) have employedthe complete form of typology, incorporating humor types and intentional relatedness, to content analyze, respectively, TVcommercials and print ads in the USA. Speck suggested that three underlying processes (incongruity resolution, arousal safety and humorous disparagement) lead to humorous appreciation. In incongruity resolution process (cognitivemechanism), some type of schema incongruity is perceived, since the advertising content differs from the generallyexpected beliefs, attitudes and/or behaviours (Alden et al., 2000). Then some advertising cues provide an explanation onthe stimulus-incongruity and lead to the appreciation of humor. In the arousal-safety process (affective mechanism) laughter occurs when a person has experienced heightened arousal but at the same time (or soon after the arousal) evaluates thestimulus as safe or inconsequential ( Rothbart, 1973, p. 249). Finally, humorous disparagement is an interpersonalmechanism for creating humorous expressions, where humor is a disguised aggression and serves as a reward for the joke-teller.The combination of the three aforementioned humor processes leads to five types of humor, namely: comic wit, sentimentalhumor, satire, sentimental comedy, and full comedy. Comic wit, involving only the incongruity resolution process, is a mind-game that leads to a humorous interpretation. Sentimental humor is based only on the arousal-safety process andconstitutes an emotional way to engender humor. Satire combines incongruity resolution and humorous disparagementprocesses. The audience laughs at a victim in an indirect way (McGhee, 1974). Sentimental c omedy is the product of cooperation between incongruity resolution and the arousal safety processes. Hence, it provides cognitive pleasure such ascomic wit and affective pleasure similarly to sentimental humor. Full comedy is based on the combination of a ll three humor processes (Beard, 2008; Speck, 1991). It is the most complex type of humor and thus the riskiest communication strategy.

Speck (1987) also analyzed the relationship between the humor elements and the message elements and yielded astructure that comprises of three types of relatedness in an ad. The present study concentrates on intentional relatednessthat refers to the primary intention of the source (advertisers) and divides humorous advertisements into humor-dominant,information-dominant and image-dominant. Humor-dominant ads have a message-within-humor structure. The main purposeof these creative executions is to entertain the target audience through humorous stories and playful copy. Humor is themessage and there is no message without humor. Informationdominant humorous ads intend to inform rather than to amuseconsumers and use humor as an attention-getting devise. Finally, image-dominant ads illustrate humorously either theadvertised products or the users of the products in order to trigger a pleasant visual imagery. In this case, humor justenriches the advertising experience.

2.3 Cultural dimensions and humor in advertising

A few frameworks have been developed to outline cultural dimensions that interpret differences in diverse culturalenvironments (De Mooij, 1998). From a marketing and advertising perspective, the most useful models are Hofstedescultural values (1984),Halls high/low -context theory (1984), Schwartzs theory (1992), Inglehart et al.s world values survey(2000) and House et al.s GLOBE project (2004). Perhaps, the most prominent one is Hofstedes study (Kirkman et al., 2006)that identifies five national cultural dimensions: power distance, uncertainty avoidance, individualism/collectivism, masculinityand long- vs short-term orientation (Hofstede, 2001). This classification originally developed as an interpretation of work-related behaviours and values in IBM Corporation. It was soon adopted and validated in the field of advertising by manyresearchers (Chan et al., 2007; Fam and Grohs, 2007; Moon and Chan, 2005; Lepkowska-White et al., 2003; De Mooij,1998; Albers-Miller and Gelb, 1996). Two studies in particular, suggest that Hofstedes work can be the basis for investigating the use of humor in ads (Lee and Lim, 2008; De Mooij, 1998).

The present study focuses on two out of the five cultural dimensions, namely uncertainty avoidance andindividualism/collectivism, since they seem to affect the use and effectiveness of humor in advertising (Lee and Lim, 2008;De Mooij, 1998).Uncertainty avoidance is the extent to which people feel threatened by uncertainty and ambiguity and try to avoid thesesituations (De Mooij, 1998, p. 83). Individualism can be defined as people looking after themselves and their immedi atefamily only while collectivism as people belonging to in -groups that look after them in exchange for loyalty (De Mooij, 1998,p. 75).

The UK and Greece are used as reference countries in this study, since they provide two culturally diverse environmentsbased on Hofstedes Framework (2001). The UK and Greece indicate significant differences with respect to Hofstedescultural dimensions, especially in terms of uncertainty avoidance and individualism/collectivism. In particular, the UK seems

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to be a very individualistic society (89 the highest score in the EU) compared to Greece (35 the fourth lowest score in theEU).

At the same time, the UK is a society with extremely low uncertainty avoidance (35, the fourth lowest score in the EU) vis-a`-vis Greece that represents the highest score in the EU (112) (Hofstede, 2001).

The UK is an economically developed member of the EU with a distinct advertising style. Direct and subtle communication,soft-sell techniques, trend-setting images, embellished with humorous puns and understatements have a long tradition in the

UK (De Mooij, 1998; Weinberger and Spotts, 1989). British advertisements reflect individualistic values and are oftendirected at particular social classes, preserving social divisions (Nevett, 1992; Weinberger and Spotts, 1989). About 10percent of advertising budgets is allocated to magazines, since practitioners prefer online and TV (national) advertising toprint ad executions (Advertising Association, 2008). Besides, the increased ratio of national to local commercials creates awide audience for the British ads (Nevett, 1992). Hence, UK advertisers aim at designing witty ads with high entertainmentvalue, which have been described as the least intrusive ads in the world (Bernstein, 1986). The UK shares cultural meaningswith other English-speaking countries such as the USA, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand and South Africa (white sample)(Ashkanasy et al., 2002).

Greece, a less economically developed member of the EU, has undergone tremendous change over the past two decadesand is going through a transition period in which the Greek economy is trying to harmonize with the rest of the EU (Lysonskiet al., 2004). It seems that this transition is expressed in the advertising content, since globalized modern/western symbolsare integrated with traditional Greek communication approaches (Zotos and Lysonski, 1994). Magazines are the primarymedia selection for Greek advertisers, since more than h1 billion (40 percent) is spent on print advertising on an annualbasis (Media Services, 2009). Greece shares some cultural similarities with Southern Italy (Naples, Sicily and SouthSardinia) (Guido, 1992), and especially with Greek speaking Cyprus (Georgas et al.,2001).

3. Hypotheses development

3.1 Humor types

Only a few studies for the usage of humor types (as defined by Speck) in advertising have been conducted (Spotts et al.,1997; Speck, 1991). However, the literature related with the presence of humor mechanisms in culturally diverse countries(Lee and Lim, 2008; De Mooij, 1998; McCullough and Taylor, 1993; Hillebrand, 1992) could provide the basis for formulationof research hypotheses, regarding the use of humor types in UK and Greek magazine ads. Each humor mechanismaccumulates some advantages, as well as some disadvantages that can either enhance or diminish the effectiveness of advertisements (Speck, 1987). It seems that the humorous disparagement process (interpersonal mechanism) is the riskiesthumor form as it may irritate and annoy consumers, when it crosses the line from tolerance to offensiveness (Meyer, 2000).If the target audience does not share the opinion being communicated, it may identify with the victimized advertisingcharacter and consider the ad insulting or offensive (Stern, 1996; Cho, 1995; McGhee and Duffey, 1983; Zillmann andStocking, 1976). Offensive humor is considered funnier in low uncertainty avoidance than in high uncertainty avoidancecultures (Kalliny et al., 2007).

Also, collectivists are less favorable to offensive advertisements than individualists (Chan et al., 2007).The arousal safety process (affective mechanism) may be perceived as offensive by the advertising audience (Beard, 2008).It is possible that the initial discomforting stimulus causes strong negative emotional responses such as irritation, fear andanger, inhibiting the safe judgment and humor appreciation (Schutzwohl and Borgstedt, 2005; Speck, 1991). Collectivisticcultures with higher uncertainty avoidance react consistently more favorably to humorous advertisements, when the arousalsafety process uses a safe judgment than when it does not. When there is no safe judgment, they have difficulty inunderstanding the joke and they are more critical about these ads compared to individualist consumers from low uncertaintyavoidance cultures (Lee and Lim, 2008).

The incongruity resolution process (cognitive mechanism) is the simplest humor process and the best to clarify a brandspositioning (Shelley, 2003; Meyer, 2000). According to Freud (1905), comic wit, which is based only on the incongruityresolution process, seems to have a lower emotional impact than sexual (involves arousal safety process) and aggressivehumor (requires the humorous disparagement process), decreasing negative emotional reactions.

Thus, a risk aversion strategy in advertising would favor the incongruity resolution process to the other two humor processes,since it seems a more neutral and less offensive way to create jokes. For instance, a risk-avoiding attitude in Germany

directs advertisers to prefer incongruity and surprise to other more offensive humor processes (Hillebrand, 1992). In Russia(a collectivistic society with high uncertainty avoidance), gag humor, a type of farce, is an unpopular humor device, sinceRussian consumers cannot understand it, whereas, in the USA, advertisements that incorporate gags are consideredextremely hilarious (Six, 2005). Furthermore, in Japan, a collectivistic, high uncertainty-avoiding culture, advertisers useoffensive humorous appeals less frequently compared with their US counterparts (Lin, 1993).

Thus, it is suggested that UK advertisers use those types of humor that involve humorous disparagement and arousal-safetyprocesses (sentimental humor, satire, sentimental comedy and full comedy) more frequently than their Greek counterparts.On the contrary, Greek advertisers avoid using the arousal safety and humorous disparagement processes, since they areriskier than the incongruity resolution process. It is expected that Greek advertisers will make frequent use of comic wit, asthis type of humor involves only the incongruity resolution process.