Richard Tansey

Cultural Themes in Brazilian and U.S. Auto Ads: A Cross-Cultural Comparison

Abstract Do Brazilian and U.S. advertisers employ different themes in print advertisements? If so, what can we conclude about cross-cultural differences in values? In our study of automobile ads that appeared in the business magazines of Brazil and of the U.S. during the 1970s, we found that (1) urban themes were used more frequently in Brazilian ads than in U.S. ads, (2) leisure themes were used more frequently in U.S. ads than in Brazilian ads, (3) work themes appeared as frequently in Brazilian ads as in U.S. ads, and (4) work themes appeared more frequently in U.S. ads as the 1970s progressed. Thus, our study suggests that values differ between the business subculture of Brazil and that of the United States. Importantly, our latter two findings disaffirm the theories of many historians and sociologists. Because the application of historical and sociological theories may produce erroneous advertising decisions, we advise advertisers to research carefully each national market before using a “standardize...

Research on Advertising Ethics: Past, Present, and Future

Abstract Research on advertising ethics, as revealed by a search of the ABI/Inform database, shows that advertising ethics has been, and continues to be, a mainstream topic in advertising research. Present beliefs about such research, as expressed by a random sample of academicians in the American Academy of Advertising, include the belief that practitioners are uninterested in ethics research. Beliefs about the future of such research, as forecast by the same academicians, include the need for better measures related to ethics. Other promising research topics are use of deception, advertising to children, ads for legal vices, negative political ads, and stereotyping in ads.

The ethics of psychoactive ads

Many of todays ads work by arousing the viewers emotions. Although emotion-arousing ads are widely used and are commonly thought to be effective, their careless use produces a side-effect: the psychoactive ad. A psychoactive ad is any emotion-arousing ad that can cause a meaningful, well-defined group of viewers to feel extremely anxious, to feel hostile toward others, or to feel a loss of self-esteem. We argue that, because some ill-conceived psychoactive ads can cause harm, ethical issues must arise during their production. Current pretesting methods cannot identify the potentially psychoactive ads; therefore, we offer some tentative guidelines for reducing the number of viewers harmed by psychoactive ads.

A Comparison of Loglinear Modeling and Logistic Regression in Management Research

There is little formal guidance in the applied statistical literature concerning the relationship between loglinear modeling and logistic regression. In order to more clearly delineate this relationship, this manuscript compares and contrasts loglinear modeling and logistic regression analysis and demonstrates the advantages and disadvantages of each technique. In addition, a formal comparison of the statistical assumptions and numerical calculation problems for both of these techniques is provided.

Personal Moral Philosophies and the Moral Judgments of Salespeople

During the last decade, Donelson R. Forsyth has developed a taxonomy of personal moral philosophies of relevance to sales managers and sales researchers concerned about the ethicality of salespeoples decisions. Forsyths Ethical Position Questionnaire (EPQ), which measures a respondents tendency to consider injury to others (idealism) and/or to disregard universal moral rules (relativism) when making moral judgments, can be used to classify salespeople into one of four personal moral philosophies: situationists, subjectivists, absolutists, and exceptionists. After a brief overview of Forsyths work and its place within sales research on ethics, the results of an empirical study of life insurance agents show that agents with different moral philosophies a la Forsyths taxonomy differ in their moral judgments about some ethically- questionable actions by life insurance agents.

Ethical Judgments about Wartime Ads Depicting Combat

Are all modern wartime ads that depict combat judged as ethical? The results of a study conducted during the recent Persian Gulf conflict suggest that the social marketing uses of such ads (e.g., t...

Dependency Theory and the Effects of Advertising by Foreign-Based Multinational Corporations in Latin America

Abstract Dependency Theory is a major paradigm of developmental economics that differs sharply from classical economic theory on a number of points. According to Dependency Theory, the ongoing economic, political, social, and cultural transformations within Latin America bring with them a greater reliance on an expanding capitalistic world system. Through this world system, advanced nations extract surplus value from underdeveloped nations, thus keeping the latter underdeveloped and condemning them to perpetual class conflicts and oppressive governments. This theory, which is accepted by many educated Latin Americans, largely explains the chilly reception that many foreign-based multinational corporations have received in Latin America. After a short introduction, four tenets of Dependency Theory are considered that are relevant to consumer advertising by foreign-based multinational corporations. Then, the evidence for and against seven propositions are considered: four of which concern conspicuous consum...

Ethical Codes and the Advocacy Advertisements of World War II

In March 1942, the Advertising Federation of America drew up an ethical code for advertisers to follow during World War II. Included among the codes thirty-nine rules were (1) to promote ‘intelligent patriotism’ (2) to ‘glorify [the] service [of workers] with our fighting forces’ and (3) to ‘arouse enthusiasm of workers for productive achievement’. Yet, despite their membership in the Advertising Federation of America and their praiseworthy goals, two major World War II advertisers unknowingly violated all three of these self-imposed rules in their advocacy advertisements about absenteeism and carelessness. Their ethical faux pas serve as an important lesson for todays advocacy advertisers.

Generalized Linear Models: Loglinear Modeling in Managerial Research

In the past three decades we have seen the emergence of the generalized linear model (GLM) techniques for analyzing discrete multivariate data when the independent and dependent variables are categorical, ordinal, or mixed. The primary statistical techniques are loglinear modeling, probit, and logistic regression. The purpose of this article is to (a) briefly describe the emergence of these discrete multivariate techniques in the medical and social sciences, (b) disclose their relationship to one another, and (c) demonstrate the utility of hierarchical loglinear modeling in managerial research

A Rapprochement between the Advertising Community and the Jungians

Abstract The advertising community maintains a long-standing interest in theories of emotion. Despite this interest, there is almost no published work relating Jungs theory of the psyche to advertising. Why? We propose two reasons and then suggest a way to introduce Jungian theory into advertising practice.