Have you ever seen images of an elegant woman dressed in period clothes, threatening to stab another woman through the neck; a model facing a leopard behind a mannequin hand; or a lady using a hook to fish a purse out of a pool, while a seemingly dead man is floating in the water? The descriptions of these scenes might sound dark and absurd, and provoke disgust or displeasure; but the fact is, these images have been used in real advertisements for prestigious fashion brands such as Gucci and Dolce & Gabbana, and were featured heavily in various fashion magazines. Recently, advertisers have sought to differentiate their products by using grotesque imagery in their ads as a strategy to get consumers’ attention and stimulate their curiosity. Although growing attention is being paid to ads that are not conventionally ‘pretty’, very little research has tried to empirically document the effect of grotesque imagery on the persuasiveness of luxury brand advertising, or unveil the psychological mechanism underlying the effect. The purpose of this research is to investigate how grotesque imagery used for luxury products appeal to consumers, and why the ads affect the consumers’ behavior. We empirically demonstrated that the grotesque imagery used to promote luxury products enhances consumers’ purchase intention because it facilitates consumers to better experience the brand by transporting them to the narratives that are portrayed in the ads. This process occurs because a correspondence between grotesque imagery and luxury branding generates the fit effect, which leads to fluent processing and feel right experience, and in turn induces engagement to the ad.
Grotesque Advertisement
Grotesque was the word indicating the style of ancient decoration that depicted fantastic combinations of human and animal forms, interwoven with strange fruits and flowers. The Cambridge Dictionary of English now defines grotesque as a general adjective that describes anything “very strange and unpleasant, especially in a ridiculous or slightly frightening way.” Evolutionary psychology provides us a hint for the reason why emotionally provocative and fear-evoking grotesque imagery captures consumers’ attention. The faster attention to negative stimuli than to positive stimuli is an automatic tendency developed as means of evolutionary adaptedness for survival because negative stimuli signal danger and cause alert to prompt defensive reaction (Ohman, Flykt and Esteves, 2001; Schoemaker 1996; Tan 2008). Another explanation for grotesque imagery’s attention grabbing power arises from our complex emotional system—i.e. human enjoys fearful horror or heartbreakingly sad films, because such negative emotions often stem from a challenging situation filled with risks, threats, and tension and generate an active interest in it (Bartsch, Apple and Stroach 2010; Oliver 1993; Tan 2008). Frightening, disgusting, or tragic emotions are mixed with a relief that comes after a perception of reality. Because human has an ability to distinguish their real life and the situation in the film or drama, we feel interests while being frightened or disgusted or heart-broken with pleasurable enjoyment (Tan 2008).
Prior research by Phillips and McQuarrie (2010) brought to light the concept of grotesque in the context of fashion marketing. They described grotesque imagery using words with common etymological meanings—bizarre, surreal, deviant, absurd, discrepant, peculiar, and odd—and suggested that it could lead viewers to engage in the ad through transportation or immersion to the story world of the ad. Through the narrative transportation, grotesque imagery persuades consumers to better experience the brand featured in the ad. Based on their conceptualization of grotesque and its persuasive power, we empirically test whether grotesque imagery used in an ad might work as a strong trigger of fantasy, stimulating viewers to be transported into the narrative depicted in the ad image.
Transportation
Transportation is defined as ‘a convergent process where all mental systems and capacities become focused on events occurring in the narrative’ (Green and Block 2000, p. 701); it represents the extent of absorption into the narrative flow of the story as it unfolds. Transportation occurs whenever the consumer experiences a feeling of entering a world brought to mind by the story, because of their empathy for the story characters and imagination of the story narratives (Van Laer et al. 2014). Previous research suggests that transportation induces favorable attitudes toward the related product (Escalas 2004), and enhances the persuasiveness of advertising messages through the connection between the self and the ad content (Escalas 2004).
Fit Between Grotesque Imagery and Luxury Branding
The effect of fit, which means a relevant and logical connection between ad contents, has been widely studied in advertising and marketing literature. Fit messages are readily accessible, and processed through simple cognitive information processes. Macinnis and Park (1991) argue that the fit effect is caused by consumers’ perception of the stimuli in ads as a whole, rather than distinct individual elements. The processing of fit (vs nonfat) messages is easier, so more fluent (Lee and Aaker 2004; Labroo and Lee 2006), and fluent processing of fit messages offer a feel right experience (Camacho, Higgins, and Luger 2003; Lee, Keller, and Sternthal 2009). This subjective experience of feeling right increases engagement (Lee, Keller, and Sternthal 2009), willingness to pay, favorability of brand attitudes, and brand choice (Lee and Higgins 2009).
In this research, we posit that persuasive effect of grotesque ads is more likely to occur when grotesque imagery is used for advertising luxury brands. Previous research explained the motivations to purchase luxury brands as scarcity, uniqueness, distance, high price (Dion and Arnould 2011; Dubois and Duquensne, 1993), and signaling of social status (Belk 1988; Zhou and Belk 2004; Han, Nunes, and Drèze 2010), which intersect with the characteristics of grotesque. People purchase luxury goods because they are relatively exclusive and limited, providing the consumer with more emotional distance from mass produced products (Hansen and Wänke 2011). In addition, positioning a brand using mythical and abstract concepts is known to be more effective in building strong prestigious brands (Arsel and Craig 2011). Because grotesque is perceived to be distant from reality, incongruent, and discrepant, these characteristics of luxury branding could overlap with that of grotesque.
Furthermore, support for our prediction of a fit between grotesque imagery and luxury branding can be found in some other common features of both. Dion and Arnould (2011) argue that luxury brands possess hedonic appeals based on multisensorial pleasure, artistic aura, and charismatic stories which transport consumers into the magical world of the luxury brand. In support, Kim, Lloyd and Cervellon (2015) found that luxury brand advertising stimulates fantasy, and this is one of the dominant themes through which consumers were engaged with the brand. They showed that being part of the narratives in the ads, participants experienced escaping from their everyday lives, traveling around the fantasy world, and feeling that their myth, fantasies or dreams become real. As luxury brand advertising has a power to transport consumers into fantasy, grotesque imagery also carries consumers away into magical world through narrative transportation (Phillips and McQuarrie 2010).
Hypotheses
In light of the prior research, we posit that when grotesque imagery is used in ads for luxury brands, the fit generates feel right experience and easy and fluent processing of messages, because grotesque imagery and luxury brand advertising commonly have a power to transport viewers to fantasy world distant from reality.
In addition, previous research has suggested positive downstream effects for transportation to enhanced brand experience. As the level of experience is enhanced, familiarity and satisfaction with the brand are heightened as well (Ha and Perks 2005). A deeper level of brand experience generates brand trust and accelerates loyalty to brands (Lglesias, Singh, and Batista-Goguet 2011). Thus, we propose the following hypotheses:
H1: Luxury brand advertising with grotesque imagery will facilitate transportation, which will in turn enrich brand experience and increase purchase intention of the featured product.
H2: There will be a perceived fit between grotesque imagery and luxury branding.
H3: The fit between grotesque imagery and luxury branding will enrich brand experience which in turn enhance purchase intention.
Study 1
The goal of Study 1 was to show that a grotesque ad is perceived to be better-matched with brands described as prestigious.
Stimuli. We designed two versions of a print advertisement for a fictitious fashion brand to manipulate grotesque (vs. non-grotesque) ad style. We created the ad by modifying the content from an existing Jimmy Choo advertisement. The print ad featured a man, a girl, a car, and a handbag placed in the middle of a desert. In the grotesque imagery condition, the girl is placed in the truck of a car, appearing dead since the man sitting next to her is holding a shovel that he seemingly used to dig a hole in the ground to bury her. In the non-grotesque imagery condition, we replaced the shovel to a cane. In the prestige condition, we introduced the brand as one with a prestigious image similar to those of Louis Vuitton and Hermes. In the non-prestige condition, the brand was described as having a brand image similar to Zara and H&M.
Procedure. 171 undergraduates (average age = 22.8 years; 171 females) participated in the study for a course credit. Participants were informed that they would be asked to complete an ad evaluation study, and were randomly assigned to be presented with one of the four print ads featuring a handbag. Participants were asked to indicate how likely they would be to purchase the handbag product (1 = very unlikely; 7 = very likely), and how well-matched the ad is to the product and the brand image on two items (‘the ad goes nicely together with the handbag’ ‘the ad looks well-matched with the image of the brand’; 1 = not at all ~ 7 = very much). Then, they completed two item transportation measures (‘While I was looking at the ad, I could easily picture the events in it taking place,’ ‘I had a vivid image of the man sitting next to the woman’; 1 = strongly disagree ~ 5 = strongly agree) adapted from Green and Brock (2000). Next, participants responded to twelve items of brand experience measure from Jos ̆ko Brakus, Schmitt, and Zarantonello (2009) (e.g. ‘This brand results in bodily experiences’, ‘This brand stimulates my curiosity and problem solving’; 1 = strongly disagree ~ 7 = strongly agree). They also rated how grotesque the ad was on seven items (‘bizarre,’ ‘surreal,’ ‘deviant,’ ‘absurd,’ ‘peculiar,’ ‘odd’, ‘discrepant’; 1 = not at all ~ 7 = very much). To rule out an affective account for participants’ evaluation, we assessed participants’ mood (1 = negative mood, bad mood, sad, irritated ~ 7 = positive mood, good mood, happy, relaxed) and their arousal (1 = not at all aroused ~ 7 = very aroused).
Results: Perceived fit. The two perceived fit items were averaged to form a fit index. A two (ad style: grotesque vs. non-grotesque) by two (brand reputation: prestige vs. non-prestige) between-subjects ANOVA revealed a significant ad style by brand reputation interaction effect (F(1, 167) = 5.69, p = .018). Planned contrasts indicated that, in the grotesque imagery condition, participants rated the ad as more well-matched when the product was described as a prestigious brand (M = 4.14) than when it was a non-prestigious brand (M = 3.53; F(1, 167) = 4.15, p = .043). In contrast, in the non-grotesque imagery condition, participants rated the ad as less well-matched when it was described as a prestigious brand (M = 3.60) rather than non-prestigious brand (M = 4.00), but the effect was not significant (F(1, 167) = 1.79, p = .183). Because the perceived fit results confirmed that participants rated the ad as more well-matched when the product was described as a prestigious brand, we created an imagery fit variable coding the well-matched conditions (grotesque imagery for prestige brand and non-grotesque imagery for non-prestige brand) to be 1, and the less well-matched conditions (grotesque imagery for non-prestige brand and non-grotesque imagery for prestige brand) to be 0. As predicted, an ANOVA revealed that the well-matched conditions showed higher perceived fit (F(1, 169) = 5.79, p = .017), such that those in the matched condition (M = 4.07) rated higher on perceived fit than those in the mismatched condition (M = 3.57).
Transportation. Participants’ ratings on the two transportation items were averaged to form transportation scores. A two way ANOVA revealed a significant ad style (grotesque vs. control) by brand reputation (prestige vs. non-prestige) interaction effect on transportation (F(1, 167) = 4.35, p = .039). Planned contrasts indicated that, in the grotesque condition, participants reported higher transportation scores when the product was described as a prestigious brand (M = 3.22) than a non-prestigious brand (M = 2.78; F(1, 167) = 4.28, p = .040). In contrast, in the non-grotesque condition, participants reported lower transportation scores when it was described as a prestigious brand (M = 2.62) rather than a non-prestigious brand (M = 2.81), but the effect was not significant (F(1, 167) = .78, p = .378).
Mediation Effect of Transportation on Brand Experience. Participants’ ratings on the brand experience scale were averaged to form brand experience scores. A series of regressions showed that the ad style by brand reputation interaction activated transportation (β = .632, p = .034), which then yielded greater brand experience (β = .360, p <.001). The bootstrap procedure for a conditional mediation model (PROCESS Model 7; Hayes 2013) using 5,000 samples revealed a significant conditional indirect effect of grotesque imagery on brand experience through activation of transportation when the product was described as a prestigious brand (95% CI [.067, .390]). This conditional indirect effect was not significant when the product was described as a non-prestigious brand (95% CI [–.189, .138]).
Multiple Mediation Effect. Our prediction was that grotesque imagery used in luxury brand advertising would lead to higher perceived fit, which facilitates narrative transportation and in turn enhances brand experience leading to greater purchase intention. Multiple mediation analyses using PROCESS Model 6 (Hayes 2013) with 5,000 resamples confirmed that the perceived fit → transportation → brand experience path mediated the effect of imagery fit on purchase intention. The imagery fit variable was created as a binary variable (1 = grotesque imagery for prestige brand or non-grotesque imagery for non-prestige brand; 0 = otherwise). First, the path from imagery fit to perceived fit was significant and positive ( = .504, p = .017), as was the path from perceived fit to transportation ( = .149, p = .007), the path from transportation to brand experience ( = .326, p < .001), and the path from brand experience to purchase intention ( = .344, p = .014). The 95% CI of the bootstrap procedure ([.001, .030]) confirmed that the indirect effect of imagery fit on purchase intention through the three mediators—perceived fit, transportation and brand experience—was significant.
Study 2
The objective of Study 2 was to test the robustness of the mediating role of transportation for the effect of grotesque imagery fit with luxury brand. In addition, we checked whether the grotesque manipulation affected the extent to which participants perceived the brand as luxurious.
Stimuli. Two versions of print advertisement were created to manipulate grotesque (vs. non-grotesque) ad style by modifying an existing Dolce & Gabbana ad campaign. The print ad featured two women, a man, and handbags placed on the floor of a classically decorated room. In the grotesque imagery condition, one of the girls wearing a ball gown is holding a knife and seemingly about to stab another girl. In the non-grotesque imagery condition, we replaced the knife with a bottle of perfume. All participants were provided with the print ad that contained a cover story about the ad evaluation task, describing the brand as either a prestigious brand that is similar to Louis Vuitton and Hermes or a brand with an image that is similar to Zara and H&M.
Procedure. 165 undergraduate students (average age = 23.8; 66 females) were randomly assigned to one of the four experimental conditions. Participants were first asked to indicate how likely they would be to purchase the featured handbags (1 = very unlikely; 7 = very likely). Then, they responded to two transportation items (‘I wanted to learn how the story in the ad ended’, ‘The story in the ad affected me emotionally’, ‘I found myself thinking of ways the story in the ad could have turned out differently’; 1 = not at all ~ 5 = very much). Next, participants responded to the same twelve-item brand experience scale, seven item grotesque measure, four mood items, and an arousal item used in Study 1. In study 2, they were also asked to rate their impression of the product as luxurious, prestigious, and high class (1 = not at all; 7 = very much).
Results. The grotesque manipulation did not affect the extent to which participants perceived the brand as luxurious, and when the product was described as a prestigious brand, participants in the grotesque condition reported higher transportation scores than those in the non-grotesque condition. Multiple mediation analyses reconfirmed that the transportation → brand experience path mediated the effect of imagery fit on purchase intention.
General Discussion
Through two studies, we demonstrated that grotesque ads can be effective in persuading consumers to purchase luxury fashion items. We found that grotesque ads trigger transportation when the brand is described as prestigious, enriching brand experience, and in turn heightening consumers’ purchase intention.
어도비 PDF
* 본 문서는 배포용으로 복사 및 편집이 불가합니다.
