Download The effectiveness of Nudity in Advertising in Three European

The Effectiveness of Nudity in Advertising in Three
European Countries
Christian Dianoux, CEREFIGE - University of Paul Verlaine – Metz - IUT, Ile du Saulcy,
57045 METZ, France – [email protected]
Zdenek Linhart, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, Kamycka 129, 165 21 Praha 6,
Czech Republic – [email protected]
Abstract
This paper shows several interesting results obtained starting from an experimentation in
which Czech, Spanish, and French were exposed to a folder of 12 pages containing an
advertisement for a mobile phone where one could see a woman showing either her face, or
being topless.
The principal differences observed in attitude toward the advertisement primarily originate in
the gender of the individuals. The Czech, French, or Spanish women tend to judge more
negatively than the men the advertisements showing a woman with the naked bust. On the
other hand, even if important differences between countries were found, nationality does not
have an influence on preferrence of the advertisement with or without nudity displayed. These
results justify to do not adapt the communication campaign with nudity in these three
countries, and undoubtedly on the European level.
Key-words
Nudity, advertising, print media, Czech Republic, France, Spain, attitude toward advertising
1
The effectiveness of Nudity in Advertising in Three
European Countries
Abstract
This paper shows several interesting results obtained starting from an experimentation in
which Czech, Spanish, and French were exposed to a folder of 12 pages containing an
advertisement for a mobile phone where one could see a woman showing either her face, or
being topless.
The principal differences observed in attitude toward the advertisement primarily originate in
the gender of the individuals. The Czech, French, or Spanish women tend to judge more
negatively than the men the advertisements showing a woman with the naked bust. On the
other hand, even if important differences between countries were found, nationality does not
have an influence on preference of the advertisement with or without nudity displayed. These
results justify to do not adapt the communication campaign with nudity in these three
countries, and undoubtedly on the European level.
Key-words
Nudity, advertising, print media, Czech Republic, France, Spain, attitude toward advertising
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Introduction
Although the use of the erotism in advertising is not a recent phenomenon (Soley and
Kurzbard, 1986), it would seem that it was accentuated these last years. The observations of
Reichert, LaTour, and Kim (2007) show that “the proportion of sexualised women rose from
less than one-third in 1964 to one-half in 2003”. Parallel to this quantitative development,
some authors have also emphasised that a qualitative evolution with “graphic sexual images
seem more extreme, more pervasive and more perverse than before” (Kilbourne, 2005). This
tendency is also observed in the general media environment. According to the last report of
Parents Television Council (PTC), the sexual references on the chains of American northern
TV increased by 22% during Family Hour when compared with programming from the same
time slot in 2000-2001 (Brodesser-Akner, 2007).
Consumer appears to be increasingly tolerant to this form of communication. A recent study
of Zimmerman and Dahlberg (2008) shows that the questioned women were less offended by
the advertisements with sexual connotation than those questioned a few years before by Ford,
LaTour, and Lundstrom (1991). Results of Toyota in the USA which increased its sales in
2007 by 3% whereas those of its main competitors dropped (- 6% for GM and -12% for Ford),
show that the American consumer does not seem to sanction publicities sexually explicit or
with violent contents (PTC had classified Toyota first in 2007, and second in 2006 in its
report of the worst advertisers - www.parentstv.org).
These various tendencies observed in the USA exist also in other areas of the world but it
seems on different levels. According to Piron and Young (1996), nudity is used less in
Germany than in the United States, because north Europeans are accustomed to certain forms
of nudity which therefore lost its impact. In the same way, the study of Nelson and Hye-Jin
(2005) which is based on the observation of the advertisements published in seven editions of
the female magazine Cosmopolitan shows strong divergences between France and Thailand
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where the advertisements have strong sexual contents, and the USA, Brazil, Korea, or China
where the sexual contents are weaker.
It is allowed to suppose that these divergences are the reflection of different attitudes from the
consumers of each country toward advertising with sexual stimuli. However, in spite of the
interest of a better comprehension of these mechanisms, rare are the studies allowing the
cross-cultural comparisons in particular in Europe (e.g. Lass and Hart, 2004; Orth and Al,
2007). Indeed, according to Moiij (2003) it would seem that “the persistence of cultural
variety of countries worldwide as well as in Europe implies that a successful advertising
approach in one country does not automatically mean similar success in other countries”.
In this spirit, the objective of this paper is to better understand the effects of the recourse to
nudity in a European advertising campaign starting from an experiment carried out in three
various European countries: in the east in a country of the former Soviet block (Czech
Republic), in the west in a country considered as tolerant with regard to this form of
communication (France), and in the south in a country (Spain) which was illustrated, as we
will further see it, by its refusal of a sexy advertising of Dolce & Gabbana accepted with
starting in many other countries. For that, after having given a literature review on the
principal research results leading to this subject, we will focus our research hypotheses by
taking into account the European context. We will present then the methodology used and the
results which come out from this experiment. We will finish by raising the principal results
and prospects which emerge for an advertiser who would wish to use this form of
communication.
1- Literature review and research question
The sexual character of the advertisement will be apprehended here starting from the dressed
degree of individuals which is the characteristic most likely to give a sexy connotation to an
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advertisement according to Reichert and Ramirez (2000). Although the dressed degree of
individuals is not always a necessary, and sufficient condition for which a stimulus could be
regarded as sexual, it remains the most obvious angle of incidence because nudity makes the
sexual connotation of the advertisement more explicit. Reichert and Ramirez (2000) showed
that more than 50% of the questioned people made a close link between erotism and nudity.
1.1.
Impact of nudity on attention, memory and attitude toward the ad
For McInnis, Noorman, and Jaworski (1991) when the motivation to process the data on the
brand is weak, the objective of the advertiser is to draw the attention to the advertisement
starting from executional cues to which the individual will be sensitive, independently of the
brand. Among these executional cues, the sexual sources are likely to play this part. Many
researches (Vezina & Paul 1997; Geuens & De Pelsmacker 1998; Manceau and Tissier
Desbordes, 2006; Lombardot, 2007) confirm this positive role of nudity on the increase of
attention.
The interest to reinforce the attention is then able to “subsequently increase brand information
processing within the ad” (McInnis, Noorman, and Jaworski, 1991). However, it would seem
that this bond between attention and treatment cannot be empirically observed when the
sexual sources are used. Lombardot (2007), starting from a review of the literature relating to
23 researches, indeed shows that nudity affects in a negative way the cognitive process of
treatment and comprehension of the message, as well as the memory of the brand, and
“paradoxically, this should lead to increased memory for sexual advertising for those
individuals for whom the use of sexual appeals is least appealing” (Davies, Zhu, and Brantley,
2007).
As for the impact of nudity on the attitude toward the brand and the intention to purchase, the
results are contradictory (Severn and Al 1990; De Pelsmacker & Van Den Bergh 1996;
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Vezina & Paul 1997). These divergences undoubtedly come from factors such as the type of
methodology used (very few studies set up experimental protocols making it possible to only
check the influence of variable nudity), the choice of the product (the use of nudity for under
clothing is undoubtedly better perceived than for a car), and the profile of the individuals. On
this last point, several individual characteristics have been indeed highlighted like the age
(e.g. differences in perception between generation Y and Baby boomers, see Loroz, 2006), the
kind with the “viewers respond much more favourably to opposite-sex sexual images than to
their sex images” (Reichert, LaTour, and Kim, 2007), or the masculinity (vs. femininity) as
regards the advertisements focused on the image and the utility aspect (Chang, 2006).
These various results make it possible to advance that the recourse to nudity should have an
impact on the attitude toward the advertisement more or less strong according to individual
characteristics such as the age or the gender in particular. The question which interests us then
is to know if this effect is homogeneous whatever the country.
1.2 Impact of nudity according to the country
For Ford, La Tour, and Clarke (2004), it is clear that the perception of nudity in advertising
varies to a significant degree according to the studied countries (China, India, Singapore, the
USA). The qualitative study undertaken by Lass and Hart (2004) in Germany, in Italy, and the
United Kingdom also goes in this direction by showing however that, apart from the
differences between country, the gender and the values of the consumers play a big role in
parallel.
If the differences in terms of gender or values do not represent a real problem for the
advertiser, since these elements are taken most of the time into account during segmentation
inside of each country, the differences between countries are on the other hand more delicate
to solve when the campaign covers an important territory. Two examples of international
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brands having roughly identical worldwide targets, illustrate perfectly the problems with
which the advertiser can be confronted (even if nudity is not here the only crucial factor). In
February 2007 advertisement for the collection of ready-made clothes Dolce & Gabbana
(showing a woman lying, surrounded by bare-chested men) had to be withdrawn from the
Spanish magazines after the complaint of the Spanish Institute of the Woman. The ad was
also withdrawn thereafter from Italy then finally, vis-à-vis this dispute, the company preferred
to stop it completely in the whole world. As for the advertising poster for the fashion
designers Marithé and Girbaud (showing a naked man, back, surrounded by twelve women,
all joined together around a table making think of the painting of Léonard de Vinci, la Cène),
it was prohibited in Italy in 2005, and finally authorised in France after a long legal procedure
which finished in 2006.
Vis-a-vis this various dispute, the question is then to know if those are the emanations of more
or less influential local groups or more fundamental differences between the attitudes of the
consumers of each country what would confirm the observations of Orth at Al (2007). These
authors indeed showed considerable differences in terms of attitude toward the advertisement
for close European countries (Croatia, The Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland). They
concluded from it that ”using one advertising campaign is questionable, if not potentially
damaging to advertisers' efforts”.
These results are on the other hand contradictory with the practices observed. Indeed, the few
comparative studies undertaken in Europe on the proportion of advertising which have
recourse to nudity show that there does not exist significant difference between the countries.
Koudelova and Whitelock (2001) who compared TV spots of the United Kingdom and in
Czech Republic, and Dianoux, Kettnerová, and Linhart (2006) who compared the
advertisements in Czech Republic and France in the 5 principal categories of journals (senior,
female, man, junior, business), have observed differences between some publishd formats, but
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none in regard to the use of nudity. We did not have such precise information concerning the
Spanish territory, at the origin of the dispute on Dolce and Gabbana, but it would seem
according to our various observations that the practices do not differ basically.
These results a priori paradoxical must however be relativised because the academic research
results presented higher are not basically contradictory with the practises observed. Indeed,
with regard to the study undertaken by Ford, La Tour, and Clarke (2004), in addition to the
fact that its objective (to identify the perception of the individuals toward the sex role
portrayal) differs from ours, it relates to two continents (Asia and North America) which
undoubtedly accentuates the cross cultural differences. The research of Orth at al. (2007)
relates to a set of themes broader than these which interest us here. Lastly, we have to note
that Lass and Hart (2004), starting from a qualitative methodology relating to a very broad
sample (students, bankers, housewives,…), watch that, in addition to the country, the
individual characteristics play a considerable part. It is thus possible that starting from a more
homogeneous target (e.g students), we did not find differences between countries, even if it is
about a product not having a direct or indirect relationship with nudity. Thus, in such a
context, we should check the following assumption for the three selected countries (Spain,
France, and Czech Republic):
H1: The superiority (or inferiority) of an ad using nudity compared with an ad not using
nudity will be the same in Spain, France, and Czech Republic in terms of attention, memory,
or attitude toward the ad.
If any differences cannot be observed between countries, it is probable that some individual
characteristics play a major role in the preference of ad using nudity in comparison with ad
not using nudity, especially from the attitude towards the advertisement. Indeed, according to
the type of advertising, the women generally express a different attitude toward the ad
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compared to the men (Putrevu, 2004). Results of Reichert and Al (2007b) confirm these
conclusions within the precise framework of a sexy advertisement. For those “overall, the
findings support a media literacy effect and a gender effect that should be considered by
advertising executives and in any media literacy component pertaining to sexualised images
of women in advertising”. These effects should be even stronger if the product being the
subject of advertising does not have a direct or indirect relationship with nudity, from where:
H2: The preferences in terms of attitude toward the advertisement resorting to nudity with
sexual connotation compared with advertisement without it will differ more because of the
sex of the individual respondent than of his nationality.
2- Methodology
2.1. The choice of the support
Magazine was used for this experiment from two reasons. It is, on the one hand, the support in
which nudity is most frequently used like Reichert at al. (1999) have shown in the American
context. In addition, the magazine facilitates, compared to the other supports, the treatment of
the message because of its positive action on two of three dimensions of MOA model of
McInnis at al. (1991): the opportunity and the ability.
2.2. The sample
The choice of a sample made up of students, though sometimes criticised (Soley and Reid,
1983), comprises the major advantage here to make it possible to have homogeneous groups
in each country, easy to compare, and being able to constitute an identical target for an
international brand. Moreover, the use of naked in advertising is accepted better by the young
people than the seniors (Manceau and Tissier-Desbordes, 2006). As for the three countries
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selected, they represent each one a strong stage of European construction (notably in terms of
practice of harmonization): France, as country founder, Spain in 1986, and the Czech
Republic in 2004. They in addition have all three of their specificities, making them
potentially different from/to each other: in the East, the Czech Republic like country of the ex
Soviet block, in the west, France, country considered as tolerant with regard to this form of
communication, and with the south, Spain, country which was illustrated lately, as we have
just seen it, by its refusal of the advertising of Dolce & Gabbana.
2.3. The choice of the advertisement
Many of researches have highlightened the different attitudes which could be generated when
the use of nudity was relevant to the advertised product (e.g. shower gel) or not relevant (e.g.
car). We will retain here the second option in order to reinforce the possible differences
between country. The mobile phone was chosen as the product, which is likely to interest all
of our sample, whatever the country and the sex of the individuals, represents a product rather
involving, and not having a direct or indirect link with nudity.
We have retained an international leader brand communicating in the three countries: Nokia
(European leader with nearly 50% of market share in Europe in 2007, largely preceding its
three main competitors Samsung, Motorola, and Sony Ericsson).
We took a real advertising of the brand on which we added a female model showing naked
bust (appendix 1), or her face on the screen of the telephone (appendix 2). To make sure of
the erotic character of the photograph, we selected ten photographs of naked models and per
successive elimination (standard Delphi) we arrived at a photograph on which all of the
questioned experts (two experts masculine and female by country) came to an agreement
based on the typology suggested by Triandis (cf Nelson and Paek, 2005): photograph
concerned with level 4 of the scale that starts from 0 = “no sexual appeal/fully clothed” to 4 =
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“nudity with bare bodies, wearing translucent under apparel or lingerie, poses where the
model wears only a towel”. The experts in addition took care to avoid what could be regarded
as a sexist ad (see Lysonski, 2005).
Lastly, the size of the advertisement being likely to influence the attention of the individual,
and Czech Republic being a country where advertisements are published more frequently on a
half page than a full page, this element will be taken into account in our experimental design.
2.4. Experimental design and procedure
The experimental advertisement for Nokia was inserted in a folder of 12 pages duplicated in
three versions (Spanish, Czech, and French). This one contained ten different advertisings (4
of a quarter of page, 3 of a half-page, and 2 of a page, plus one or the other of the
experimental advertisements for Nokia presented either on half of a page, or on a full page).
The cover page (with title “campus”) and the advertisements were strictly identical in the
three countries (except of course the rare texts requiring a translation). As for the articles, they
treated all of the similar subjects likely to appear in a review intended for the students. The
experimental design is summarised in table 1.
Table 1: Experiment plan
Nokia ad with naked woman (ad-NW)
Nokia ad with face of woman (ad-FW)
Ad size
Half size
Full size
Half size
Full size
Total
CR
43
44
45
47
179
SP
40
44
43
42
169
FR
44
44
32
46
166
Total
259
255
514
The folders were given out with the following comment: “a new magazine model is being
tested which may become the students’ magazine. However before finalizing this model your
opinion would be appreciated concerning the form and the content. A short period of time is
11
allotted you to consult the model (10 minutes exactly), after we will ask you some questions
on the subject.“
Ten minutes after the participants were showed the folder, they were asked to close the
magazine with the cover page facing upwards, and to answer a first questionnaire. This
questionnaire concerned notably the attitudes toward the advertisement in general (Mehta,
2000), spontaneous and assisted recall of brands and products in this magazine, and purchase
intention for five telephone brands.
When everyone had finished answering the first part of the questionnaire, they were asked to
re-open the folder and to carefully look at the experimental advertisement. They then had to
answer different questions. The principals were: 4 questions to determine those who declared
having paid attention to the ad; 21 questions to measure verbally the affective reactions
(Derbaix, 1995); 8 questions about their attitudes toward the ad (Aad) with each item used as
a separate Aad indicator (adapted and extended from Coulter, 1998; MacKenzie, Lutz, Belch,
1986); 4 questions destined to measure the beliefs concerning the brand (quality), attitude
(like the phone Nokia), and intention (would like to have and intention to purchase); 16
questions to evaluate the product involvement concerning mobile phones (Kapferer and
Laurent, 1986). All items in English were translated in Spanish, Czech, and French with the
back translation and decentring procedure suggested by Brislin (1976), and was finalised by
three focus groups from each country.
3- Results
With regard to the attention, those which were exposed to ad-NW (ad with naked woman) are
more numerous to state to have paid attention to this ad (answer given with the advertisement
under the eyes), that those exposed to ad-FW (ad with face of the woman), and that whatever
the country (table 2).
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Table 2: Attention toward the ad according to the country
I paid attention to this ad (5points Osgood scale)
CR
Spain
France
Ad with naked woman (adAd with face woman (adNW)
FW)
Half-page
Full page
Half-page
Full page
96
99
73
93
p.=0.061
90
96
68
84
p.=0.027
88
93
66
77
p.=0.048
Mean rank- Kruskal-Wallis test
On the other hand, if the individuals able to quote spontaneously the name of the brand Nokia
(complete sample) are proportionally more numerous in the group of the ad-NW than in the
group of the ad-FW, this difference is not significant with the threshold of 5% (table 3). The
comparisons country by country do not make it possible either to note differences. Also let us
note that the remark of Baron (1982) that “sexual arousal created on page 1 may contribute to
the appeal of a product advertised on page 5”, does not seem to have to apply here, at least
with regard to memory. The spontaneous recall of the name of the advertised brand Nokia is
indeed very largely the best score obtained (m=82%) compared to all other ads for
international brands inserted in the folder (i.e. Coca-Cola, Yves Saint Laurent, and Smart
which have scores lower than 70%), and no significant difference is observed between
individuals exposed to the ad-NW and the ad-FW with regard to the spontaneous memory of
these three brands. Lastly, let us notice that if the individuals exposed to the ad-FW in the full
page remember better than those exposed to the same advertisement on a half page, we
haven’t found any difference between half page and full page for the individuals who were
exposed to the ad-NW.
Table 3: Recall of the brand name (any confused group)
Ad with naked woman (adNW)
Half-page
Full page
Ad with face woman (adFW)
Half-page
Full page
13
Spontaneous quotation of the
advertised brand (Nokia)
No answer or bad answer
84,3%
84,0%
78,1%
82,4%
15,7%
16,0%
21,9%
17,6%
N=121
N=125
N=105
N=125
Chi² = 1,85 - df = 3 - p=0,602
As for the verbal measurement of the affective reactions produced by the advertisement, we
can note that for all items, the ad-NW systematically causes negative or positive reactions
stronger than the ad-FW. This tendency can be observed in each of the three countries with
bigger differences for Czechs and French than for Spanish. The fact that the advertisement is
on full page or half-page does not change anything.
With regard to the attitude toward the advertisement (table 4), the tendencies are identical
whatever the country. It would seem that overall Czech, Spanish and French prefer the ad-FW
(though no significant with 5%). This preference seems to come from a perception of lack
from serious of the ad-NW since the individuals (whatever the country) tend to consider this
one as having a less convincing message, and information less objective than the ad-FW,
whereas the two advertisements were strictly identical as regards the informational contents.
Nudity would thus cause to discredit the contents of the advertisement in each of the three
countries.
Table 4: Comparison of attitude toward the ad-NW and the ad-FW in each of the three
countries
I like this ad
This ad is good (nice to look at)
The message is completely convincing (you
are favourable)
The information in this ad is objective
This ad appeals more to feelings than to
reason
CR
Naked Face
82
97
p.=0.061
92
87
p.=0.481
79
100
p.=0.006
78
101
p.=0.002
111
69
p.=0.000
Spain
Naked Face
79
90
p.=0.130
79
90
p.=0.173
74
95
p.=0.003
75
94
p.=0.008
103
66
p.=0.000
France
Naked Face
77
90
p.=0.075
82
84
p.=0.768
75
92
p.=0.026
72
94
p.=0.004
102
61
p.=0.000
14
90
89
p.=0.928
110
70
p.=0.000
85
94
p.=0.221
The quantity of information in this ad
satisfies you
This ad is unusual
This ad is sensual (sexy)
76
93
p.=0.028
111
59
p.=0.000
93
76
p.=0.027
74
91
p.=0.017
92
73
p.=0.009
95
69
p.=0.000
Mean rank - Mann-Whitney test
Generally, tendencies in each of the three countries are similar, of the complementary
treatments allowed to show that, among the measured variables likely to influence attitude
toward the ad, it was the gender which was basically discriminating. The men give marks
largely higher to the ad-NW compared to the women (on the items such as “I like this
advertisement” or “this ad is good”), whereas there is no significant difference between the
two groups for the ad-FW. Further conclusions can be derived from the comparison of the
attitude to the ad-NW and the ad-FW inside the woman group and the man group. It is noted
here that the results are completely opposite (table 5): the men prefer the ad-NW compared to
the ad-FW and the women the ad-FW compared to the ad-NW.
Table 5: Comparison of ad-NW and ad-FW between men and the women
Men
I like this ad
This ad is good (nice to look at)
The message is completely
convincing (you are favourable)
The information in this ad is
objective
This ad appeals more to feelings
than to reason
The quantity of information in
this ad satisfies you
This ad is unusual
This ad is sensual (sexy)
Naked
134
144
122
117
154
121
150
146
Face
112
p.=0.014
102
p.=0.000
126
p.=0.634
130
p.=0.147
90
p.=0.000
126
p.=0.542
95
p.=0.000
100
p.=0.000
Women
Naked
98
Face
164
p.=0.000
103
160
p.=0.000
106
158
p.=0.000
107
156
p.=0.000
160
107
p.=0.000
119
144
p.=0.007
160
107
p.=0.000
125
139
p.=0.117
Mean rank - Mann-Whitney test
15
The observation of the affective reactions show an identical tendency. The men are more
appealed, interested, satisfied, agreeably surprised, captivated, delighted, enthusiastic toward
the ad-NW than toward the ad-FW, whereas the women on these same items prefer the ad-FW
(p.< 0.05).
For negative items as irritated, unpleasantly surprised, saddened, the two groups of men give
identical answers for the two advertisements, whereas the women allow higher marks to the
ad-NW than the ad-FW (p.< 0.05). It would seem however that nobody is fooled by recourse
to nudity since on item “while looking at this advertisement, it made me suspicious” the
answers of the two sexes are convergent: the women as the men are more being wary with
regard to the ad-NW.
Let us notice however that if the differences observed in terms of attitude toward the ad
between the group exposed to the ad-NW and that exposed to the ad-FW are strongly
influenced by the sex of the individual and not his nationality, we can observed the influence
of the nationality when we compare the three countries with regard to ad-NW and ad-FW
separately. Indeed, that it is for the ad-NW or the ad-FW, the attitude toward the ad differs to
a significant degree between Czech, French and Spanish (Table 6). However this difference
between country does not come from the presence or the absence of the nudity characteristic
in the advertisement, because we find quasi exactly the same tendencies in the answers for the
ad-NW and the ad-FW.
Table 6: Comparison of ad of three nationalities for each of the two advertisements
I like this ad
This ad is good (nice to look at)
The message is completely convincing
(you are favorable)
The information in this ad is objective
CR
149
115
120
123
Ad-NW
France Spain
127
112
p.=0.005
136
137
p.=0.093
141
127
p.=0.140
107
160
p.=0.000
CR
151
121
104
126
Ad-FW
France Spain
126
103
p.=0.000
126
135
p.=0.419
149
130
p.=0.000
120
136
p.=0.356
16
This ad appeals more to feelings than
to reason
The quantity of information in this ad
satisfies you
This ad is unusual
This ad is sensual (sexy)
145
166
146
105
132
p.=0.008
122
p.=0.000
125
p.=0.025
142
p.=0.001
110
138
99
158
116
140
142
135
135
p.=0.016
116
p.=0.000
121
p.=0.136
113
p.=0.099
109
105
120
133
Mean rank - Mann-Whitney test
More basically, it would seem to be a question of a difference in terms of attitude toward
advertising in general rather than of a preference of a country for the use of nudity in
advertising. Indeed, if no significant difference between men and women were detected on all
of the items measuring the attitude toward the advertising in general, on the other hand very
significant differences (largely lower than 0,01) are observed since one compares the answers
of Czech, Spanish, and French. Nevertheless this difference between country does not come
from presence or from absence of nakedness characteristics in the ad, because we find quasi
exactly the same tendencies in answers for ad-NW and ad-FW.
Conclusion
The results obtained within the framework of this experiment confirm our two hypotheses. If
nationality does not influence the attitude toward a sexy advertisement compared to an
advertisement without sexual connotation, the same tendencies being observed in Czech
Republic, Spain and France, the gender on the other hand influences ad whatever the country.
The results of Maciejewski (2004) which show that ladies clearly have a more negative
attitude than men towards advertisements with sexy modelling women (from the kind of scale
“It is right to use appeals involving sex when selling sunscreen”), and that this is independent
of the philosophic opinions of the individuals, is confirmed here and we can add that this is
independent of the country of the individuals. The advertisers which would raise the question
of the relevance of the recourse to nudity in their campaign must thus more be attentive with
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the definition of their target in terms of gender than about the European country in which
advertising will appear.
Nevertheless, these results which justify a homogeneous used of sexual stimulus in an
European campaign when this one is considered more efficient than an ad not using it, do not
have to conceal the fact that attitudes toward the advertising in general and attitude toward the
ad can vary in a significant manner between several European countries even for a priori
homogeneous target.
In addition to the necessary extrapolation of this work to a greater number of European
countries in order to further validate our assumptions, several limits have to be underlined.
First of all, the type of product selected does not justify the recourse to nudity. What would
happen in the case of a product more coherent with nudity? Wouldn't the difference observed
between men and women tend to become blurred with the profit of other variables? Then, our
experimentation took into account only female nudity, it would be interesting to take into
account the male nudity even less current, but which seems to currently develop (Elliott and
Elliott, 2005), and with regard to which one differences between country could perhaps be felt
more strongly. Lastly, the choice of our experiment on a global brand and targeting the young
people can have erase regional differences. What would happen in the part of an older target
and perhaps more influenced by a more anchored cultural past? Further, besides the choice of
a target a priori more opened to this form of communication, it is necessary to note that the
contextual aspect is likely to orientate results following the example of Moorman, Neijens,
and Smit (2002) which showed that “magazine induced liking and positive feelings had a
positive influence on the attitude toward the ad.“ What reaction would occur if the same ad
appears in a female or masculine magazine?
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Appendix 1: Advertising for Nokia with naked woman
Insert ad-NW
Appendix 2: Advertising for Nokia with face woman
Insert ad-FW
22
Dear Professor,
Please find our manuscript, entitled “The Effectiveness of Nudity in Advertising in Three
European Countries” attached here for submission to the International Journal of Advertising.
Although many studies focused on the nudity in advertising have been published and that the
question of the standardization or the adaptation of ads is often put in particular within a
European framework, rare are the studies undertaken from a point of view of international
comparison. We believe IJA represents an ideal outlet for this work, which provides both
managerial and theoretical implications.
We hope you agree there is a need for further work on this topic. Therefore, consider our
article for publication, please.
Yours sincerely,
Christian Dianoux & Zdenek Linhart
23