Racial cues, involvement and advertising: An information processing perspective.

Abstract

This investigation examined the effects of racial cues on the processing of a print advertisement within the framework of Petty & Cacioppo's (1981) Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM). An experiment was conducted in which 139 subjects (71 blacks and 68 whites) evaluated a print advertisement. Based upon pretest results, a product of low personal involvement was selected to appear in the advertisement. The race of the models (black or white) and the quality of the product claims in the advertisement (strong or weak) were manipulated. In addition to evaluating the advertisement, subjects responded to a thought-listing item and an open-ended recall item. It was predicted that the presence of black models would increase black subjects' involvement with the advertisement, leading them to base their evaluations on the content of the product claims. In all other conditions, it was predicted that low involvement would lead subjects to base their evaluations on peripheral cues in the advertisement. The results of a series of analyses performed on subjects' responses to the evaluative items and the open-ended items revealed that despite subjects' expected low levels of involvement with the advertisement, their reactions to the advertisement were significantly affected by the both the content of the product claims and the race of the models. Both black and white subjects evaluated the message more positively when it featured strong, rather than weak product claims. In addition, the presence of black models led black subjects to respond positively to the advertisement and reduced the number of thoughts they generated in response to it. For whites, the presence of black models had no effect on their evaluations of the advertisement but it led them to generate a significantly greater number of thoughts than they did in response to the presence of white models in the advertisement. These results provide support for prior research findings that have shown significant influences of racial cues on the manner in which blacks evaluate print advertisements. In addition, they provide support for the ELM by demonstrating that racial cues have significant effects on the extent to which blacks and whites process print advertisements for products which are considered to produce low levels of involvement.