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Impact of Nudity in Advertisements: Comparison of the First Results from Spain, France and the Czech Republic Christian Dianoux, CEREFIGE - University of Paul Verlaine – Metz - IUT, Ile du Saulcy, 57045 METZ, France Zdenek Linhart & Jana Kettnerová, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, Kamycka 129, 165 21 Praha 6, Czech Republic Abstract Whilst recognising that complaints about nudity vary between different countries and regions, it is important to understand what the impact of nudity is on consumers. The question of whether to maximise the impact of nudity through standardisation or adaptation of advertisements, has become the object of many researches. International comparisons of nudity impact are still rare. In this article we present the initial results of the first survey about the topic conducted amongst Czechs, French and Spanish. All the respondents were exposed to a journal folder containing a hidden advertisement with either a picture of a semi-naked woman, or a picture of the face of the same woman. Firstly, trials show that answers are influenced more by the gender of the respondents than by their nationality. Czech, French and Spanish women tend to react more negatively than men, when shown a picture containing an image of a woman’s breast. Secondly, the answers of Czechs are less negative than those of the French and Spanish respondents. We consider that further research is therefore needed to provide more detailed answers about the relationships between such variables as product, cultural differences between countries, and attitudes to advertising in general. 1 Introduction Complaints about the sexual connotation of messages in advertising are becoming more and more frequent, but many researchers emphasise that this tendency is often generalised. Lombardot (2002) found this tendency in articles of authors like Hoyer and MacInnis (1997), Wells, Burnett and Moriaty (1998) or in a much older one by Sciglimpaglia, Belch and Cain (1978). Within each of these articles it was observed that “…a trend toward the increasing use of sex in advertising can hardly be disputed”. These impressions seem to be more noticable when media repeatedly speak about “scandalizing advertising”. We can cite two very controversial pictures of a nude man (the “vice champion” of aikido, Samuel Debeker) where we can see his sex used in the launching of a perfume from Yves Saint Laurant (YSL), or more recently in February 2007, in the advertising of Dolce & Gabbana clothes collection, which had to be withdrawn from Spanish magazines after complaints from the Spanish women’s institute (the advertising was then withdrawn from Italy and finally totally stopped worldwide). This particular advertisement showed a topless man wearing black glasses, who was holding a woman on the ground by her wrist. This woman was dressed in a black satin corset and high heels, and around the scene there were some men watching without any involvement in their faces. This scene invoked thoughts of collective rape. Researchers counting the ratio of Advertisements with sexual motives make these subjective impressions more relative. According to literature review carried out by Lombardot, it would seem that these feelings would essentially be due to more frequent and explicit sexual references, to the greater degree of nudity acceptable in advertising, or to the kind of studied review, and not only to the increasing ratio of advertising with a sexual connotation - as Kilbourne (2005) summarises “Graphic sexual images seem more extreme, more pervasive and more perverse than before”. Whatever the tendency, the impact of this kind of communication varies substantially from one region to another. Thus, we can notice that, according to Piron and Young (cited by Lombardot 2002), nudity is used less in Germany than in the USA, because north Europeans are more used to certain kinds of nudity, causing it to lose some of its impact. Some advertisements can be judged indecent in USA, yet normal in Europe. The study of Nelson and Hye-Jin (2005), which relies on observations of advertisements published in Cosmopolitan magazine in seven countries (Brazil, China, France, India, South Korea, Thailand, and USA), also show large divergences between France and Thailand where advertisements have strong sexual content, and China where the sexual content is lower. Despite greater awareness, and the question of standardisation of such advertisements, there are few studies about this subject. The objective of this article is to contribute to best knowledge in this context from an experiment made in one country in the East, the West, and the South of Europe. For this, we will first define what is understood by “nudity”, and we will make one statement on the main results of research made about this topic. This will permit us to define our research question. We then present the methodology used and the first results arising from this experiment. We will finish by outstanding points and principals related to main perspectives that we can forecast from complementary processing. 2 Literature overview Notion and impact of nudity are discussed to bring a research question. Notion of nudity It is expected that talking about nudity in advertising also has a sexual context. “But, nudity is not necessary, neither sufficient, to make the stimuli considered as sexual” (Lombardot, 2002). The reactions of the Spanish and Italians to the Dolce & Gabbana advertisement mentioned above, where a non-sexual attribute was shown (totally dressed women and naked bodies of men), perfectly illustrates this point, as do Catholic churches which are filled with nude paintings. Nevertheless, among the frequent characteristics giving the advertisement a sexual connotation, Reichert and Ramirez (2000) showed that the degree of clothing of the individuals was the characteristic most likely to produce this impression, as the very proximity of nudity implies sexual suggestions. Among the direct link between nudity and sexual suggestions, we can observe that even the idea of nudity can vary significantly between different cultures and periods: spiritual tribes may consider an undressed woman as normal, however a fundamentalist Muslim will consider it as inadmissible and close to sanctions; within any one country, therefore, undressed bodies can be either tolerated or sanctioned against. As an example we cite the town council of Declambre, Lousiana (USA), which unanimously added underwear to the list of what must not be revealed under the State’s indecent exposure law, threatening offenders with a $200 fine and the risk of up to six month in jail (BBC report, 2007-07). It should be emphasised in the end that clothes, which are accepted as normal today, were scandalous at the beginning of the 20th century. These different remarks illustrate the interest of studying the impact that nudity can have on an advertisement. But, what is known about this subject? Impact of nudity on the influence of an advertisement The impact of nudity and sexual appeal has a positive role (Manceau & Tissier, 2006). Both nudity and sex-appeal are confirming that displaying the positive role of nudity increases attention towards the advertisement and brand (Vezina & Paul, 1997; Geuens & De Pelsmacker 1998; Soley & Reid 1998). Studies notice, however, that results relative to its impact on attitude to the brand, and purchase advice, are contradictory (Severn et al. 1990; De Pelsmacker & Van Den Bergh 1996; Vezina & Paul 1997). This is probably coming about for several reasons, such as methodological problems (very few studies are based on experimental protocols, permitting verification of the influence of nudity the only variable), the studied context (using nudity for underwear is probably better received than for a car), and the profile of individuals, some of whom can take a central road, while what comes first into our mind is that one sexual element in the advertisement seems to attract the customer on the periphery (Reichert and al. 2001). The approach proposed by McInnis, Noorman, and Jaworski (1991) can bring to mind some elements of the answer. For these authors, when the motivation to process information about the brand is low, the attention to the message is consequently also low. What is likely to catch the attention, are executional cues in the advertisement which an individual will notice, independent of the brand. Among these executional cues, sexual sources are likely to play this role. After this first stage of the process, and having had attention drawn to the advertisement, the individual next begins to increase its brand information processing within the advertisement. 3 This theoretical approach no longer conforms to the empirical results. Lombardot for example, from a review of literature inspired by the works of Jones, Stanaland, et Gelb (1998), talking about 23 research studies, shows that in spite of divergent results, a consensus seems to emerge on the fact that nudity increases arousal, interest, and attention (towards executional elements), and affects in a negative way the cognitive process of message treatment and understanding, and brand memorization. Such results show that there is still a lot of work to be carried out to better understand these mechanisms, and bring us to affirm that the measure of implication towards the product category is a fundamental minimum, even though this one doesn’t permit us to focus on motivation, in its general sense. Two other dimensions proposed by McInnis et al. (1991), opportunity and ability, seem not to be influenced by the sexual character of the advertisement, and we will consider later in the methodology part how these elements can be considered. Beyond the motivation - the determining factor, which brings the individual to process more or less information - other individual characteristics play a role in the attitude that the individual could have towards advertisements with sexual characteristics. We cite: - age (Loroz, 2006- for instance emphasized the existing differences between Y generation and Baby boomers), - gender (men would seem to have a positive attitude towards the presence of nude (or sexy) female models, and to have an opposite negative or neutral attitude towards the presence of nude (or sexy) male models, and is inversely for women, see Lombardot 2002), - masculinity or femininity (especially about advertisements focused on an image or utilitarian aspect, see Chang, 2006). Research question None of this, however, gives us much information about the differences which can exist between countries. Ford, La Tour, and Clarke (2004) are clear that the perception of nudity in advertising varies in a significant way between the countries they studied (China, India, Singapore, USA). The qualitative study carried out by Lass et Hart (2004) in Germany, Italy and the UK comes as same in this sense, whilst pointing out that the gender and consumers’ values also play an important role whatever the country. It would therefore seem that practices can be relatively homogeneous in some cases. Dianoux, Kettnerová, and Linhart (2007) showed in a review based on the ten most-issued journals in the Czech Republic and in France, for the five main market segments (seniors, ladies, men, teenagers, businessmen), that no difference can be noticed in terms of quantity, and that the usage of nudity remains marginal in the two countries (see Table 1). 4 Table 1: Comparison of the Content of French and Czech advertisements (N=577 Advertisements except for (1) N=361 Advertisements) France Indoor Environment 77% Female Presence (1) 78% Use of a celebrity (1) 16% Use of Nudity (1) 3.4% Information with at least 6 characteristics 13% Czech 88%* 75% 19% 2.9% 27%* * Significantly different at p < .05 (Chi² test) Considering such homogeneous practices, the hypothesis that we are naturally brought to do is that practices are equivalent, and the efficiency of this executional cue seems to be similar in the two countries. Considering these contradictory hypotheses, which seem to implicate an incidental approach due to the culture of the studied countries, we will try to verify if some differences exist between the two countries (Czech Republic and France) about the attitude towards the advertisement, and consequently also about the attitude towards the brand, based on the principle that the advertisement has an influence on the brand (Mitchell et Olson, 1981 ; Shimp, 1981). To vary the study context, we will compare these results to those of Spain. This country has shown us its high sensibility towards the provocative advertisement, by its reaction to the Dolce & Gabbana clothes collection in February 2007 (mentioned in the introduction), which led to the cancellation of this European campaign. Methodology The experiment is developed around the following four main principles: choice of media, support of sample, of advertisement, and organization of experimentation. Choice of media support The advantage of the magazine advertising media is that it allows two fundamental elements, which are expected to influence the message processing (McInnis et al., 1991): - - the opportunity: according to Chaiken and Eagly (1976) “One strategy for controlling encoding speed is to use print media. Print enables consumers to process brand information at their own pace”. They also found enhanced comprehension of a difficult message with print versus broadcast media (see also Andreoli and Worchel 1978; Wright 1981); the ability: Lang and Lanfear (1990) report research indicating that “both print and TV messages with (vs. without) narrative structures enhance comprehension and message recall”. Choice of sample The selection of a well chosen sample of students has the major advantage of observing individuals from each country homogeneous enough and easy enough to compare. From another point of view, the usage of nudity in advertising targeted at young people is very common and facilitates the processing of results. Finally, from point of view of external validity, if we observe differences between countries in this kind of sample (generally consideration is more international), there is a high probability that we would observe the same phenomena, as well as more frequently cited phenomena, in other categories of 5 individuals. The converse therefore is that, in the opposite case (no differences between groups), it is difficult to extrapolate the results. Choice of advertisement There are many studies which consider the different attitudes, which could be generated when there was coherence between the product and the usage of nudity (e.g.|: shower gel) or noncoherence (e.g.: car). We will focus here on the second option, which is in keeping with the logic of our research question, and permits us to examine the eventual differences between countries. The choice of the product was a mobile phone, which may be expected to interest the whole sample whatever the country and gender of the individuals, represents a product needed by most people, and with no direct or indirect link with nudity. Regarding the brand, we have focussed on an international brand, operating in all three countries: Nokia. For the case of simplicity, we have taken an advertisement of the brand, to which we added either a picture of a topless lady or of her face only (see annex 1). Nudity could refer to a natural image (a child, an angel in the church, etc. …) or an erotic image. We have focussed here on the erotic character, which is the most frequently studied and corresponds to our topic. Knowing in addition that several forms of nudity are possible, we have retained the higher level of the scale, which was proposed by Triandis (1995) that ranges from 0 = “no sexual appeal/fully clothed” to 4 = “nudity with bare bodies, wearing translucent underapparel or lingerie, poses where the model wears only a towel.” Organisation of experimentation The two experimental advertisements (topless or face) were inserted in a 12-page folder, which, whatever the country, contained: -endpaper entitled “Campus” not necessitating a translation -page 2: a ½ page advertisement for women’s clothes (advertiser: YSL) and another ½ page advertisement for a car (advertiser: Smart) -page 3 : an article on a scientific subject -page 4: a ½ page advertisement for a drink (advertiser: Coca-Cola) and a ½ page article on the history of the brand name -page 5a: a ½ page article offering architectural information concerning the sample region (Prague, Valence or Metz) and an experimental advertisement for Nokia on the other half of the page. -page 5b: a full page experimental advertisement for Nokia -page 6: information on Erasmus grants -page 7: information on Erasmus grants -page 8: information on possible activities to do in the sample region (Prague, Valence, or Metz) -page 9: a full page advertisement on plane trips (advertiser: Air Europa) -page 10: advertisements on various training courses -page 11: an information page for students -page 12: an advertisement for a film (Ice Age) Thus a total of 10 different advertisements (4 one quarter page advertisements, 3 half page advertisements, and 2 full page advertisements, plus the experimental advertisement). Although the endpaper and the advertisements were totally identical in the three countries (except of course the texts, which were translated), the articles were talking about similar subjects but not totally identical because it was necessary to adapt the content to each country. 6 The two folders were submitted to two samples of students in each of the three countries according the following experimentation plan: Czech Republic Nokia advertisement with topless lady Nokia advertisement with face of the lady Total 87 92 179 Spain 84 85 169 France 88 78 166 Total 259 255 514 The delivery of the experimental journal folder was accompanied by the following comment: “We are testing a new shape of journal, which could become the journal for campus students. Before finalizing this shape, we would like your advice on its shape and content. We will give you a few minutes to have a look on it (10 minutes exactly). Then we will ask you some questions about it”. The experimentation proceeded as follows: - after 10 minutes of reading the journal, students were requested to close the journal and answer the first part of questionnaire including particularly questions about memorization and the intention to buy - When everybody had finished the answers of the first part, they were requested to open the folder once more, look attentively at the experimental advertisement, then to answer questions in the second part of questionnaire: the attention concerning the advertisement (Lombardot, 2005), affective reactions (Derbaix, 1995), attitude towards the advertisement (Falcy, 1997), trust in quality and attitude (like this Nokia mobile phone), and intention to buy. Then this questionnaire was concluded by questions measuring individual implications of respondents towards mobile phones (Kapefer et Laurent, 1986). In fact, in a high involvement situation, the efficiency of advertising depends mostly of arguments of the advertisement, so arguments are generally less important then the high involvement. In the low involvement situation, efficiency is mostly linked to the ‘sympathy’ felt towards the advertisement (developed for example by a sexy model) and to the broadcast frequency (Moser, 1998). First results Although some complementary processing was indispensable to permit more detailed understanding of the differences between the countries, the first results have already given some answers to some parts of the questions. Among the three fundamental variables on which the advertisement is likely to have an effect: memorization, attitude toward the advertisement, and brand, it is interesting to note differences between countries concerning memorization and attitude towards the advertisement. This could be explained by the more particular attention of the French and Spanish towards the advertisement because of its sensual attractivity. We can observe in Table 2 that French people, who have best assisted memorisation of the over promoted brand Nokia, are also those who consider the advertisement with the naked topless lady the most sensual. They have given more attention to the advertisement (with or without the picture of the topless lady). The observation of the spontaneous memorisation also shows similar results even though non-significant. Conversely, with regards to the attitude towards the brand, we can notice no difference between the countries, whether the group of people were exposed to the advertisement showing the topless lady, or not. 7 Table 2: Differences between countries concerning nudity in advertisement Naked woman Face woman Averages of scales CR France Spain CR France Spain Q8b- Can you mark which brands of phones you have seen in the advertisement Q10c- I have paid attention to this ad when reading the journal Q12h- This advertisement is sensual Q6c- Spontaneous mention of Nokia as being a brand that was the object of an advertisement in the folder 119 139 130 N=259 – pc= 0.041 89 150 150 N= 259 - pc= 0.000 105 142 142 N=259 - pc= 0.001 77% 89% 86% 126 135 121 N=254 – pc=0.302 93 156 136 N= 253 - pc= 0.000 135 113 133 N= 255 – pc= 0.099 79% 88% 74% Chi²=4,9 – df=2 –pc=0.086 Chi²=4,6 – df=2 – pc=0.097 Kruskall Wallis test except of Q6c Chi² Reading Table 2 more closely it is seen that differences between countries exist whatever the kind of advertisement, except with regard to assisted memorisation. These results then bring us to think that it is not the stimuli variation used in the advertisement which provokes these differences, but, more fundamentally, the differences belonging to each nation. Table 3 confirms this argumentation by showing that, when we observe the scores of each advertisement in each of the three countries, the tendencies are exactly the same concerning the advertisement (we have only taken in the table the significant differences and a trust threshold of 95%). Table 3: The most significant items of country attitudes towards advertisement Czech Republic France Spain Averages of scales Naked Face Naked Face Naked Face Q12b- this ad appeals more to feelings than to reason 103 63 N= 166 – pc=0.000 92 56 N=151 – pc=0.000 96 61 N=158 – pc=0.000 Q12c- Information is satisfactory Q12d- advertisement is kind of unusual (CR), usual (SP, FR) 83 83 N=166 – pc=0.922 101 65 N=166 – pc=0.000 67 84 N=150 – pc=0.015 84 67 N=152 – pc=0.017 71 87 N=158 – pc=0.026 102 53 N=158 – pc=0.000 Q12e- information seems to be objective 72 94 N=166 – pc=0.002 67 86 N=151 – pc=0.008 69 89 N=158 – pc=0.005 Q12f- message is convincing 74 92 N=166 – pc=0.014 80 86 N=166 – pc=0.438 69 84 N=152 – pc=0.032 90 60 N=152 – pc=0.000 69 89 N=158 – pc=0.004 86 71 N=158 – pc=0.037 Q12h- ad is sensual Finally, it would appear that it might be rather the gender of the individual which influences the attitude towards the advertisement. Table 4 illustrates it perfectly, as many more men clearly prefer the advertisement with the topless lady and think her pleasant to look at, whilst we can notice exactly the opposite for the ladies. Table 4 : The most significant items of attitudes on advertisement towards gender Men Women Averages of scales Naked Face Naked Face Q12a- generally, I like this advertisement Q12g- this advertisement is nice to look at 128 104 N=234 – pc=0.006 136 94 N=234 – pc=0.000 8 91 150 N=241 – pc=0.000 96 145 N=241 – pc=0.000 Conclusion Maciejewski (2004) has shown 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. We can see here that it is not only the attitude of women to sexual messages which differs from men’s attitudes; there are other indicators which also differ between the countries studied. Beyond the fact that these results are worthy of deeper statistical investigations to detail relationships, four main limitations should be emphasised: - The kind of product chosen here doesn’t naturally justify the use of nudity. What would happen in the case of a product more coherent with nudity? - We only studied here the reactions to female nudity; it will be also interesting to study male nudity which, with the exception of some rare studies, has never really been investigated, despite the fact that it seems to be growing more common in recent times. (Elliott and Elliott, 2005) ; - The choice of known brand would be justified for the previous reasons, therefore we could repeat this kind of experimentation with a totally unknown brand and chosen differently in each country - The selection of a sample of students may have erased the regional differences. References Beetles, Andrea C., Harris, Lloyd C. (2005), Consumer Attitudes Towards Female Nudity in Advertising: An Empirical Study, Marketing Theory, December, Vol. 5, Issue 4, p397-432. Chang Chingching (2006), Cultural Masculinity/Femininity Influences on Advertising Appeals, Journal of Advertising Research, September, 315-323. Elliott Richard, Elliott Christine (2005), Idealized images of the male body in advertising: a reader-response exploration, Journal of Marketing Communications, Vol. 11, N° 1, 3-19. Ford J.B., La Tour M.S., and Clarke I. 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