Teenagers' response to self- and other-directed anti-smoking messages: A cross-cultural study

While the de-marketing of smoking among teenagers has received wide attention in the literature, few have examined the issue of whether messages should be uniform across cultures. Globally, the vast majority of anti-smoking messages are based on fear appeals portraying negative effects on the (poten...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inInternational journal of market research Vol. 49; no. 4; p. 515
Main Authors Miller, Chip, Foubert, Bram, Reardon, James, Vida, Irena
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Henley-on-Thames Market Research Society 01.01.2007
Subjects
Advertising
Cultural differences
Market strategy
Smoking
Smoking cessation
Studies
Teenagers
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Summary:While the de-marketing of smoking among teenagers has received wide attention in the literature, few have examined the issue of whether messages should be uniform across cultures. Globally, the vast majority of anti-smoking messages are based on fear appeals portraying negative effects on the (potential) smoker him/herself. This research suggests that such a global strategy may be suboptimal. Specifically, while ads portraying the negative consequences of smoking to oneself may work for teens from individualist cultures, they are less effective in collectivist cultures. In contrast, messages orientated towards the adverse effects on other people are more effective in collectivist environments. Given the astronomical amounts spent on anti-tobacco advertising, this finding offers significant advantages for creating effective anti-smoking messages.
ISSN:1470-7853
2515-2173
DOI:10.1177/147078530704900409