A causal structure analysis of advertising effects on attitudes toward foreign brands

The present study examined the causal structure of advertising effects on consumers' attitude toward foreign brands in an advertising situation. The objectives of the study were to investigate effects of various factors regarding advertising, country perceptions and product on brand attitude, and to identify the causal mechanisms among the factors that were postulated to make up the causal structural system formulated based on relevant theories and previous research.Three theoretical models were constructed and tested using structural equation modeling techniques in an attempt to obtain a satisfactory structure model. The final respecified model describes advertising effects on attitude toward the foreign brand as a causal structure system consisting of seven latent factors: attitude toward the advertisement (Aad), attitude toward the advertiser (Aadvt), ad cognition (Cad), brand cognition (Cbr), country perception (Ccoun), attitude toward the brand (Abr) and attitude toward the act of purchase (Aact).The analyses of data showed the significant roles of the advertised brand's country affiliation and consumers' attitude toward the advertiser in determining their attitude toward the brand at the exposure of advertisement. Aadvt, Aad, Cbr and Ccoun were found to be direct positive causal factors of Abr. Results of the study also indicated that attitude toward the advertisement works on attitude toward the act of purchase only through attitude toward the brand. Identified through hypotheses testings and model comparisons, a causal structural model was presented explaining the relationships among the above factors.This study also found that the relative strengths of these factors tended to differ according to consumers' product knowledge levels. Results of data analysis suggested that the effects of the Ccoun and Cadvt factors were relatively stronger among consumers with high product knowledge than those with low product knowledge. Attitude toward the ad was found more important than country perceptions and brand evaluation for consumers with low product knowledge.U of I OnlyETDs are only available to UIUC Users without author permissio