Title: A two-nation experiment to investigate the relationships among national culture, individual-level cultural variables and consumer attitudes toward advertising websites and the brand

Authors: Kazuhiro Kishiya; Gordon E. Miracle

Addresses: Faculty of Commerce, Kansai University, 3-3-35 Yamate-cho Suita Osaka, 5648680, Japan ' Department of Advertising and Public Relations, Michigan State University, 404 Wilson Road Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA

Abstract: This research investigated how the attitudes of Japanese and US consumers toward three types of advertiser websites, and their attitudes toward the brand advertised on them, compared to the attitudes of consumers with independent and interdependent self-construals toward the same websites and brand. The three types of websites were informative, socially interactive, and entertaining. Some of the results confirmed previous research; some did not. For example, Japanese consumers tend to have a more positive attitude than US consumers toward a socially interactive advertiser website; consumers with an interdependent self-construal also tended to have a more positive attitude toward the website. But regardless of the type of website, US consumers had a more positive attitude toward the brand. To some extent both national culture and individual-level variables were found to be useful predictor variables for consumer attitudes toward advertiser websites and brands. The results suggested numerous additional directions for further research.

Keywords: international advertising; advertising research design; cross-cultural advertising; intercultural advertising; internet advertising; electronic advertising; cultural variables; advertising websites; informative websites; socially interactive websites; entertaining websites; consumer attitudes; brands; Japan; USA; United States; national culture; individual-level variables; online advertising; e-advertising.

DOI: 10.1504/IJKESDP.2016.075984

International Journal of Knowledge Engineering and Soft Data Paradigms, 2016 Vol.5 No.2, pp.146 - 160

Received: 21 Jul 2015
Accepted: 29 Sep 2015

Published online: 20 Apr 2016 *

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