Costly Signalling as Persuasion Heuristic in Advertising

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UNIVERSITY OF GRONINGEN

Costly Signalling as Persuasion

Heuristic in Advertising

An Application of Evolutionary Psychology for an Improved Understanding of Advertising Effectiveness

Master of Science Thesis

Merijn de Ruijter van Steveninck

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University of Groningen, 2010 | MSc Thesis: “Costly Signalling as Persuasion Heuristic in Advertising” 3 Author: Ruijter van Steveninck, M. de

State University Groningen Faculty of Business & Economics Master of Science Business Administration, Marketing Management

Costly Signalling as Persuasion

Heuristic in Advertising

An Application of Evolutionary Psychology for an Improved Understanding of Advertising Effectiveness

Master of Science Thesis

Merijn de Ruijter van Steveninck

December 2010

Supervisors:

Karel-Jan Alsem (k.j.alsem@rug.nl) Debra Trampe (d.trampe@rug.nl)

Address Author: Acacialaan 24b 3941JR Doorn +31 616402813 merijnderuyter@gmail.com Student number: s1752553

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Management Summary

Intro

There are different opinions of the rationale behind advertising. Advertising could be defined as either a mirror of human nature or as socialization force, which shapes human behaviour (i.e. nature versus nurture). The implications for determining advertising effectiveness are contradicting in both views. Evolutionary psychology and the social sciences are the two opposing research streams. In case of evolutionary psychology, unconscious needs or drives are the basis. Evolutionary psychologists state that the mind is a set of information-processing machines that were designed by natural selection to solve adaptive problems faced by our hunter-gatherer ancestors (Tooby and Cosmides, 1997). On the other hand, social scientists argue that the contents of human minds are primarily free social constructions, and are autonomous and disconnected from any evolutionary or psychological foundation (Tooby and Cosmides, 1997). In this thesis the contradicting views are analyzed in order to get a better understanding of advertising effectiveness. In case of evolutionary psychology, advertising effectiveness will be enhanced if the evolved human nature is taken into account in the development of advertisements. Furthermore, the social sciences state that it is unethical and scientifically unsound to apply an evolutionary psychology perspective. In this thesis it is argued that the evolutionary psychology viewpoint, in contradiction to the social sciences, provides a unifying framework in determining consumer behaviour. Therefore, advertising practitioners could improve advertising effectiveness while applying evolutionary psychology. Furthermore, this thesis arguments why it is not unethical and in fact appropriate to take advantage of the lessons which could be learned from evolutionary psychology.

Literature Study

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different motives and the expected behaviour of humans. The aim of this thesis is to extend these models to an advertising context, thus to improve the effectiveness of advertising.

Conceptual Model and Research Design

The research question constructed for this thesis is as follows: what is the impact of the joint interplay of costly signals, active motives and gender on advertising effectiveness? Costly signals are operated by advertisements based on conspicuous consumption or blatant benevolence appeals. They were created for four products (Hummer, Giro 555, a purebred dog and an MBA). Advertising effectiveness was assessed by measures of brand loyalty (attitude and behaviour). Furthermore, this study accounted for previous build product associations which could influence the results. It was checked whether people’s status (i.e. equivalent of conspicuous consumption) or pro-social (i.e. equivalent of blatant benevolence) associations influenced the results. See table 1 at the end of the summary for an outline of the main study. In accordance to predictions by evolutionary psychologists, and specifically the studies of Griskevicius et al. (2007, 2009), the hypotheses generated in this study are depicted below.

Hypothesis 1: Costly Signalling

There is a three way interaction between costly signalling appeals (i.e. conspicuous consumption and blatant benevolence), active motives (i.e. romantic motives and neutral motives) and gender for the measures of advertising effectiveness (i.e. attitude and behaviour). Specifically, romantic motives are positively related to the measures of advertising effectiveness for conspicuous consumption appeals if one is man. Controversially, romantic motives are positively related to the measures of advertising effectiveness for blatant benevolence appeals if one is woman. Furthermore, neutral motives are not related to the measures of advertising effectiveness.

Hypothesis 2: Status and Pro-Social Associated Products

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Hypothesis 3: Status and Pro-Social Associated Products, Strengthened by Costly Signalling Appeals There is a three way interaction between product associations strengthened by costly signalling appeals (i.e. status/conspicuous consumption and pro-social/blatant benevolence), active motives (i.e. romantic motives and neutral motives) and gender for the measures of advertising effectiveness (i.e. attitude and behaviour). Specifically, romantic motives are positively related to the measures of advertising effectiveness for status associated products strengthened by conspicuous consumption appeals if one is man. Controversially, romantic motives are positively related to the measures of advertising effectiveness for pro-social related products strengthened by blatant benevolence appeals if one is woman. Furthermore, neutral motives are not related to the measures of advertising effectiveness.

The design of the experiment was a two (participant sex) by two (active motive: mating versus neutral) by two (costly signalling appeals: conspicuous consumption versus blatant benevolence) repeated measures design. Sex and mental state were between-participants factors, whereas costly signalling appeals were within-participants factors.

Results and Discussion

For the behaviour component of advertising effectiveness the predicted three way interaction was found in case of hypothesis I. Although, it has to be noticed that the interaction effect was significant at a 90 percent confidence level, therefore the results have to be interpreted with some caution. Specifically, the results showed that men with romantic motives scored higher on the behaviour measure when persuaded with conspicuous consumption appeals than blatant benevolence appeals. For women, the opposite was true. Furthermore, participants in the neutral active motive showed a similar behavioural pattern. For the attitude component of advertising effectiveness, no three way interaction effect was found. However, also for attitude a main interaction was found between costly signalling appeals and sex. In specific, men scored in both active motives higher for attitude when persuaded by conspicuous consumption appeals. For women there was no significant interaction. Hypotheses II and III were not supported, therefore previous build product associations did not have main effects.

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the literature is not clear about it. Although Curlo (1992) suggest that people may prefer and choose brands even though they dislike their advertisements, i.e., ad disliking does not necessarily lead to brand rejection and vice versa.

Implications

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Purpose Stimulus Measures Results/Conclusions

To examine the interactions between costly signalling (i.e. conspicuous consumption and blatant benevolence), active motives (i.e. romantic motives) and sex in determining advertising effectiveness. Costly signalling appeals Four product advertisements for each category. Advertised products:  Hummer  Giro 555  Purebred dog  MBA Active motive

Romantic priming via imagination and description of a romantic date.

Attitude toward the product

Three 9-point scales:  bad-good 

unfavourable-favourable  negative-positive Behavioural intentions

Three 9-point scales:  The extent to

which

participants were interested in finding out more about the products.  How likely participants were to consider purchasing them.  How likely participants were to actually purchase them.

The results indicate a three way

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Preface

Finding an interesting topic for my thesis was not very complicated. It was quite harder to transform an interesting topic into a sound model. I am always interested in the hidden justifications of human behaviour. Therefore, studying marketing is very interesting because consumer behaviour displays all kinds of human behaviour one could imagine.

In my quest to find a research topic for this thesis, my attention came to applications of evolutionary psychology for marketing practices. While reading about evolutionary psychology I became more and more fascinated by its theories. Even more fascinating was the debate between evolutionary psychologists and its offenders. Specifically, the debate about the origin of sex roles was sometimes hilarious. What to think of this recent quote from Gad Saad on his weblog regarding a publication about congenitally blind men preferring the female hourglass figure: “Well, in today’s post, I discuss a new study that yet again kills the apparently immortal socialization dragon!” Realize that Saad is a professor and prominent propagandist of evolutionary psychology. On the other hand, social scientists, are not free as well from vague and ungrounded insinuations, as becomes clear from a quote of Begley (2009) in a Newsweek article: “Let’s not speculate on the motives that (mostly male) evolutionary psychologists might have in asserting that their wives are programmed to not really care if they sleep around.” Begley is science columnist for the Wall Street Journal and was senior science writer for Newsweek. Unfortunately, the debate is actually more like a political campaign then a fair scientific debate. My observation of this debate is that, in this case, social scientists are fighting a background battle. Driven by ideological reasons, and an obsession for political correctness, they wish to change human behaviour. However, they do not realize that life itself is not political correct (whatever that means). The aim of my thesis was to make these topics relevant for marketing and I believe that I succeeded.

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Chapter 1 Introduction

“Marketing is designing, producing, advertising, delivering, pricing, and selling products that satisfy consumer preferences: the economic analogy of sexual selection through mate choice.”

Geoffrey Miller in The Mating Mind (2000)

1.1 Nature versus Nurture as Marketing Antithesis

The nature versus nurture discussion is a controversial psychological debate. According to an encyclopaedia, the nature versus nurture colloquialism refers to popular debates about the degrees to which one’s innate nature and human experiences (“nurture”) have a direct or causal influence upon one’s ultimate physical and behavioural traits (WordiQ). Today, more and more scientists are inspired by this debate and are trying to relate it to marketing practices. Broadly spoken, there are two apparently contradicting research streams according to the nature versus nurture discussion, the evolutionary psychologist’s perspective and the social scientists perspective. This thesis links theories of evolutionary psychology to advertising effectiveness.

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our ancestors, who lived in environments where they had limited access to such vital resources (Colarelli and Dettmann, 2003). On the other hand, according to social scientists, advertisers and media professionals dictate the preferences of people. For example, men are more in favour of slender women because of the advertising standards, is their explanation (Saad, 2007). The proposition of this study is that the perspective of evolutionary psychologists, in comparison with the social scientists, is more reliable. According to Saad and Gill (2000), the broad and all-encompassing theoretical propositions of evolutionary psychology and its growing acceptance in various disciplines, is expected to be viable in the field of marketing.

Evolutionary psychology is not mainstream and relatively new in the field of marketing. The struggles of evolutionary psychologists in marketing can be illustrated by using the following example. In the year 2000, Saad and Gill introduced some applications of evolutionary psychology in marketing and ten years later, Saad – professor and ‘apostle’ of evolutionary thinking in marketing - wrote a paper with the title: “The collective amnesia of marketing scholars regarding consumers’ biological and evolutionary roots”. Furthermore, during a symposium in 2008 named: “Homo consumicus: emerging research in evolutionary consumer behaviour” the status of evolutionary psychology in marketing was discussed. It was stated that evolutionary approaches to study human behaviour have led to broad theoretical advancements in the field of biology, economics, anthropology, and psychology. Yet empirical research utilizing evolutionary models in marketing discipline’s top journals has thus far been mostly absent. Moreover, there is some significant resistance from in particular the feminist movement over the years. Illustrated by the social scientist Begley (2009): “Evolutionary psychology is popular for obvious reasons, it addresses these very sexy topics, it is all about sex and violence, and has an obsession with Pleistocene just-so stories”. This combination of a lack of a significant amount of highly rated publications and ideological resistance could possibly explain the stagnating progress of practical evolutionary psychological scientific research in the marketing discipline.

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advertisement directed to young males that features young and attractive females is likely to get their attention and to develop into a positive emotion toward the product. Consumer products and advertisements are likely to tap into evolved psychological mechanisms when they provide information similar to that provided in contexts that gave rise to the evolution of a particular psychological mechanism (Colarelli and Dettmann, 2003).

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1.2 Research Questions

This study combined the two described studies of Griskevicius et al. (2007, 2009) and tested it with real products. As described, men are more willing to conspicuously consume in a romantic context in contrast to a neutral context and women are in the same context more open for blatant benevolence. The question arises if those mechanisms function as well when translating them to the evaluation by men and women of advertisements. That is, to what extent is there a joint interaction between costly signals (i.e. conspicuous consumption and blatant benevolence), active motives (i.e. romantic) and gender in the context of advertising effectiveness?

1.2 Managerial and Theoretical Value

Firstly, advertising managers have to make a decision about whether to target men or women for their product advertisements. Realize that advertising managers could differentiate between their advertisements for men and women. Secondly, they have to take into account the active motive of the receiver activated before displaying the advertising (i.e. romantic in this case). Lastly, they have to create their advertising appeals in congruence with the active motive and the target group (i.e. conspicuous consumption appeals in case of men and blatant benevolence appeals in case of women.

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programmes and is suitable for print advertisements. More specific, advertising practitioners could programme their print advertisements during or after romantically loaded content. Therefore, if it is true that those mechanisms work as well in creating advertisements, managers could consciously create advertisements based on conspicuous consumption and blatant benevolence and they could specifically focus on men or women. Furthermore, there are technologies that identify gender and mood1. Extrapolating from that, is seems to be possible in the future to personalize advertisements in such a way that it interacts with characteristics of the receiver. Therefore, the added value of this study is that it gives advertising and media professionals tools in designing advertisements and decision making in case of targeting specific groups. In the end, this could improve the return on advertising investments. Return on advertising investments will be welcome, especially if one realizes the amount of money annually circulating in the industry, $445 billion globally in 2009 (Plunkett Research, 2010). Thus, the goal of the study is to examine the interactions between costly signalling (i.e. conspicuous consumption and blatant benevolence), active motives (i.e. romantic and neutral) and sex in an advertising setting.

Theoretically, this study contributes to the consumer behaviour literature in such a way that it is an extension of the studies of Griskevicius (2007, 2009). In specific, this study is more relevant in determining advertising effectiveness. Furthermore, it responds to the requests of several researchers who believe that evolutionary psychology could contribute to marketing knowledge (e.g. Saad and Gill, 2000; Saad, 2007, 2010).

1.4 Thesis Outline

This thesis contains a literature review, a conceptual model, a research design, results and a discussion respectively. Firstly, the literature review discusses perspectives on advertising, costly signalling as strategic and sex specific self-presentations. Secondly, the conceptual model presents the model build for this thesis. Thirdly, the research design depicted the way in which this study is constructed (i.e. pilot study and main study). Furthermore, the results outline the main findings of this study. Finally, the discussion summarizes the findings, critically discusses the implications and limitations and offers some suggestions for future research.

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Chapter 2 Literature Review

“The tale of Aladdin, from the 1,001 Arabian Nights, offers a serviceable metaphor for consumerism. The poor boy Aladdin discovers a magic lamp and a secret cave. When he rubs the lamp, he releases a terrifying but powerful Genius. This Genius of the Lamp grants Aladdin many wishes – rich food on silver plates, embroidered clothes, fine horses, the intimidation of a sexual rival, forty gold basins, and a marble palace set with jasper, gold, and rubies. In

Aladdin’s case, the reproductive payoffs of releasing and mastering the Genius are real: he wins the love of a princess and sires a long line of kings.”

Geoffrey Miller in Spent (2009)

2.1 Perspectives on Advertising

2.1.1 Advertising Defined

To determine the interactions between costly signalling, active motives and sex in determining advertising effectiveness, the perspectives of evolutionary psychology and the social sciences regarding advertising are set out. Of particular interest in this study is the controversial role of gender in advertising effects.

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 Sector one, Passive individuals: Learning theories and information processing, psycho-dynamic theories and psycho-linguistics.

 Sector two, Passive social/cultural groups: Critical theory, propaganda, and ideology, structuralism and semiotics, postmodernism and anthropology.

 Sector three, Active individuals: Information economics and uses and gratifications theory.  Sector four, Active social/cultural groups: Socio-linguistics, feminism, social semiotics and visual

persuasion theory and post structuralism.

When relating this grid to evolutionary psychology and the social sciences, evolutionary psychology could be mapped into the passive individual’s domain and the social sciences into the active social/cultural groups. Next, the relation between the different perspectives in regards to their domain is outlined.

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2.1.2 Passive Individuals and Evolutionary Psychology

Passive Individuals

The major theoretical approaches used by marketing academics and advertising practitioners for explaining ‘how advertising works’ are located in the sector passive individuals (Percy & Elliot, 2005). Relevant in this case are the psycho-dynamic theories. Psycho-dynamic has a long history in both applied marketing research and critical views of advertising effects (Percy & Elliot, 2005). The psycho-dynamic theories of Freud have dominated this domain and have been most popular in this regard around 1950. Motivational research showed that the unconscious mind plays an important role in our responses to advertising (Percy & Elliot, 2005). Standing on the premise that consumers are not always aware of the reasons of their actions, motivational research attempts to discover underlying feelings, attitudes, and emotions concerning product, service, or brand use (Schiffman and Kanuk, 2004). According to Schiffman and Kanuk (2004), Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of personality provided the foundation for the development of motivational research and is a cornerstone of modern psychology. They stated that this theory was built on the premise that unconscious needs or drives – especially biological and sexual drives – are at the heart of human motivation and personality.

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they buy. These researchers tend to see consumer purchases and/or consumption situations as a reflection and an extension of the consumer’s own personality. However, several of Freud’s colleagues disagreed with this contention that personality is primarily instinctual and sexual in nature. Instead, these neo-Freudians believed that social relationships are fundamental to the formation and development of personality. Thus, there is a lot of disagreement about the way human behaviour has to be viewed. Evolutionary psychology is in particular interested in unconscious needs and is introduced next.

Evolutionary Psychology

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An Evolutionary Perspective on Sex Roles and Advertising Preferences

From an evolutionary perspective men and women differ in some evolved mechanism. According to Colarelli and Dettmann (2003) this is due to different adaptive problems faced by the sex and the differences in traits favoured by sexual selection (Miller, 2000). Because of the physiological and psychological demands associated with gestation, birth, lactation, and attachment, human females provide more parental investment in offspring than males (Andersson, 1994). Parental investment is the effort and resources devoted to an offspring that improves its chances of survival. The welfare of children is more dependent on the mother staying alive than the father (Högberg and Broström, 1985). Therefore, natural selection favoured women who were less prone to risky and aggressive behaviour. Although contextual factors (e.g., threats of offspring) can trigger aggressive behaviour in women, women are, on average, significantly less aggressive, more fearful, and less prone to take risks than men (Campbell, 1999). Women’s greater parental investment also helps to explain why women are more nurturing and have a greater interest in children than do men.

Members of each sex engage in intra-sexual competition to compete for access to desirable members of the opposite sex. In most primate species, including humans, male-male competition is more intensive than female-female competition. In male-male competition, males compete with one another for status, resources, and social dominance. They do this ultimately to gain access to sexually receptive females (Geary, 1998). Female-female competition involves competition for high-quality males for mating and marriage partners. Women typically compete with one another for resources by presenting themselves in ways that are viewed as attractive to men, ways that “mirror the attributes associated with male choice of mating partners, such as physical attractiveness”.

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Regarding evolved preferences Colarelli and Dettmann (2003) stated that much of traditional marketing mirrors evolved sex differences. Product development and advertising reflect the constellation of evolved sex differences grouped under the categories of communal (e.g. concern for others, interpersonal harmony) and agentic (e.g. task emphasis, competition) orientations. Women are more communal and men more agentic (Archer, 1996). Colarelli and Dettmann (2003) gave also examples: gender-based toy preferences appear to be due more too innate propensities than socialization and women tend to form closer ties with same-sex friends than men; female groups are less hierarchical than male groups. Furthermore, they argued that marketers have taken advantage of intensive, flat female networks by engaging women to directly sell to their friends.

As regards to sex competition, Colarelli and Dettmann (2003) argued that people engage in same-sex (i.e. intra-same-sexual) competition to make themselves more attractive to the opposite same-sex than their competitors. A central arena of female-female competition is physical attractiveness. This helps to account for the appeal of cosmetics to women and for the success of the cosmetics industry: the function of cosmetics is to enhance physical beauty. Women are the primary consumers of cosmetics; men account for only 7 percent of the market share (Colarelli and Dettmann, 2003). Much of male-male competition involves competition over status, resources, and reputation (Buss, 1999). The implications are that products that assume little sex differences in sexuality and competitive orientation often fail in the marketplace (Colarelli and Dettmann, 2003). Thus, according to evolutionary psychologists, advertising effectiveness could be different in case the receiver is a man or a woman. Next, the domain and viewpoint of the social sciences is presented.

2.1.3 Active Social/Cultural Groups and the Social Sciences

Active Social/Cultural Groups

This sector considers a number of relatively recent applications of theory to advertising; these views take a strong social orientation and assume active participation on the part of advertising’s audience (Percy and Elliot, 2005). Relevant in this case are feminism and post structuralism.

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always from a critical perspective that implicates advertising in maintaining and even enhancing aspects of male subordination of women. According to Milner and Collins (2000), sex-role portrayal in advertisements is an extensively studied topic. Researchers interest in this area results from a variety of factors, the most important of which are that marketers use gender as a primary segmentation variable and that social scientists use advertisements to examine gender stereotyping in the media. These research efforts typically focus on female portrayals. They consistently indicate that women often are not favourably portrayed and that their roles are frequently narrowly defined (Milner and Collins, 2000). For example, a study of Furnham and Mak (1999) showed that males are frequently shown as the authoritative central figures, whereas females are more likely to be users of the advertised products.

Secondly, post structuralism will be discussed for the reason that it has a broad view on the influence of advertisements on people’s behaviour. A basic assumption of post structuralism is that communicative texts are subject to polysemy: that is, it is open to multiple interpretations by the audience. Furthermore, Schiffman and Kanuk (2004) stated that a late-twentieth-century development in advertising theory was that of meaning-based models. These see advertising not as a conduit of information but as a resource for the construction of personal, social, and culturally situated meanings where human reality is mediated. In this view, consumers construct a variety of meanings from advertising as outcomes of a personal history and subjective interests as expressed through their life themes and life projects. This view of the influence of advertisements is relevant for this study, because it is related to the view of social scientists, who believe that socialization processes are on the basis of advertising effects. Thus feminism and post structuralism perspectives are based on other principles than the viewpoint of evolutionary psychologists. The associated broad research stream of the social sciences is discussed next.

Social Sciences

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is a process whereby social systems and practices develop from variations and by a process of trial and error, rather than through deliberate design. With cultural evolution, acquired characteristics, such as behaviours and values, are culturally selected and retained. For example, according to Saad (2007), social scientists propose that the mediums of popular culture teach us what it means to be male or female. This viewpoint is inherent to the tabula rasa premise, namely that we are born with empty minds with various subsequent socialization forces shaping us into the individuals that we become. Thus, the viewpoint of the social sciences could also be related to advertising practices. For example, when the media are a socialization force, the media have a significant responsibility to the society. For the reason that it dictates what is appropriate and inappropriate behaviour. The implications for advertising preferences are discussed next.

The Social Sciences Perspective on Sex Roles and Advertising Preferences

The social sciences point of view regarding sex roles is best captured by a quote about the interaction effects of sex-role identity and positioning from Jaffe (1991): “Children learn at an early age which personality traits are linked to their own gender”. The argumentation of Jaffe (1991) is given in the next sentences. By virtue of our gender we learn the appropriate ways to behave in accordance with society’s definition of masculinity and femininity. Masculinity and femininity are the two components of sex role identity. Conventional measures of masculinity include traits often associated with the modern women such as “assertiveness” and “leadership ability”. Conventional measures of femininity include traits often associated with the traditional woman such as “tenderness” and “compassion”. Sex-role inventories have been developed to determine the degree to which individuals adhere to society’s definitions of masculinity and femininity. Our culture has arbitrarily clustered a diverse collection of personality attributes into two mutually exclusive categories – masculinity and femininity – prescribed as more desirable for one or the other sex. Individuals, however, differ on the extent to which they adhere to these idealized standards of masculinity and femininity, with sex-typed individuals adhering more strongly to the traditional standards.

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several studies demonstrated that even though participants often said that they did not prefer stereotypical depictions of men and women in advertising, or elsewhere, their reactions to advertisements and commercial spokespersons, and their purchase intentions and behaviours were more favourable in response to gender-stereotyped than to non-traditional advertisements. They argue that this research did not only imply that traditionally gendered depictions sell products, but it is also implied that the public was more familiar and comfortable with gender-stereotyped advertisements. Thus, the media are a strong socialization factor according to this view. Next, evolutionary psychology will be compared with the social sciences and it is argued why the perspective of evolutionary psychology is selected for this thesis.

2.1.4 Evolutionary Psychology versus the Social Sciences

Evolutionary psychologists and social scientists agree about the existence of gender differences and the significant changes which have occurred in gender roles and in gender-based divisions of labour. One of the major gender differences is the achievement-affiliation orientation where males are supposed to have a higher level of achievement orientation (Prakash, 1992). In accordance to Prakash (1992), achievement orientation involves the drive to accomplish external goals, to achieve success, and being assertive, independent and self-centred. Affiliation orientation involves concern for other people’s feelings, seeking approval from others, creating nurturing relationships with others, and maintaining interpersonal harmony. Perhaps the most notable of these changes are the dramatic influx of women into the workforce and the progress women have made at entering professions and filling positions once held almost exclusively by men (Morrison and Shaffer, 2003). The occurrence of both an increase in the number of women entering the work force and an evaluation of women’s roles in society has forced dramatic inquiries into the way women think about and purchase many products and services (Jaffe, 1991). However, the disagreement between evolutionary psychology and the social sciences is about the underlying forces which shape the stereotypes over time, and their implications for marketing and advertising practices are different depending on the viewpoint. If one agrees that people are born with empty minds and that socialization forces are shaping us, then the implications are that advertising could be used as strong socialization force in order to persuade potential customers.

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and – including biologists – assailed it as an attempt “to provide a genetic justification of the status quo and of existing privileges for certain groups according to class, race, or sex”. Unfortunately, such opponents seem to be driven be ideologically beliefs. The paradox is that a genetic justification of human nature, does not hinder ideologically driven aspirations. If the genetic justification is true, then it seems to be better to accept the evolved differences between men and women, in order to anticipate on the consequences. For example, men and women have to be treated equal, therefore people argue that it is inappropriate to display women in advertisements as subordinate to men. It could be argued that it is more helpful to understand why such advertisements are successful (i.e. if they were not successful, they were never used). Thus, such effective advertisements are the messenger of the problem, not the problem itself. At least, that is the viewpoint taken for this thesis.

Therefore, in comparing evolutionary psychology to the social sciences, this thesis supports the viewpoint of Saad (2004). According to him the social sciences provide a hopelessly inadequate framework for explaining human behaviour. First it has failed in providing a unifying framework from which the disparate social sciences, so the consumer behaviour disciplines, can communicate with one another. Second, proponents of the social sciences do not provide an explanation of the genesis of the myriad of human cultures nor do they provide a rationale for the universality of specific socialization processes. In their view of the world, culture and socialization are the only forces which shape human behaviour. Third, the social sciences solely provide explanations at the proximate level whereas a full understanding of the panoply of the human experience requires theories at both the proximate and ultimate levels. Within the context of human behaviour, proximate explanations address how behaviours, emotions, and/or cognitions function and what they produce as final outcomes. Ultimate explanations address the why question, that is, they provide adaptive explanations as to why specific behaviours, emotions, and/or cognitions exist in the manner that they do.

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2.1.5 Applications of Evolutionary Psychology for Advertising

Marketers wishing to advertise their products face twodifferent types of decisions according to Saad (2004). First, they must decide on the financial and logistical components of the advertising campaign. This includes determining the budget for the campaign, establishing its reach and frequency, deciding which promotional tools to use, and subsequently integrating these into a coherent advertising strategy. Second, they must make a slew of creative decisions with regard to the contents and execution formats of the advertisements. Should the ads employ humour? Will the audience be receptive for romantic appeals? Given the increasing acceptance of evolutionary psychology in the scientific community, Bagozzi and Natarajaan (2000) espouse a need for creative research applying this framework to marketing. In light of their suggestion and the lack of such research in the marketing literature, a potential fruitful opportunity is foreseen in the application of this paradigm to marketing (Saad and Gill, 2000).

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important role in the development of preferences for many consumer products and marketing practices (Burnham and Phelan, 2000). As the consumer culture emerged, marketing tapped into psychological mechanisms in developing products and advertisements. For example, John B. Watson was one of the first psychologists to recognize the importance of emotional appeals in advertising (Buckley, 1982).

Griskevicius et al. (2007, 2009) were the first in showing empirically the value evolutionary psychology could have for marketing. They presented the joint interaction of active motives (i.e. romantic versus neutral), costly signals (i.e. conspicuous consumption versus blatant benevolence) and gender. These studies are from an evolutionary psychology perspective relevant because of the relation between different motives and the expected behaviour of humans. Building on the results of those studies, this thesis will investigate if the hypotheses are applicable in an advertising setting. Below, key issues of the studies are presented.

Study I

Griskevicius et al. (2007), “Blatant Benevolence and Conspicuous Consumption: When Romantic Motives Elicit Strategic Costly Signals”:

Romantic motives: Men + Conspicuous consumption (i.e. expensive watches) Women + Blatant benevolence (i.e. supporting charity funds)

Study II

Griskevicius et al. (2009), “Fear and Loving in Las Vegas: Evolution, Emotion and Persuasion”:

Romantic motives: Men and women + Scarcity appeals (i.e. limited edition)

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2007). Thus, the studies of Griskevicius (2007, 2009) are helpful in combining evolutionary psychology theories to advertising effectiveness. The next paragraph presents the core topics of both studies.

2.2 Interaction between Costly Signals, Active Motives and Gender in Determining Advertising Effectiveness

2.2.1 Costly Signalling as Strategic and Sex-specific Self-presentations

According to Griskevicius et al. (2007) costly signalling is the theory that a variety of conspicuous displays can serve important communicative functions, advertising an individual’s ability to garner scarce resources and possibly signalling the possession of desirable traits that could be passed on to offspring (i.e. advertising your personal competitive advantages in order to attract potential mates). According to Zahavi (1975), it utilizes the handicap principle and a prime example of a handicap is the peacock’s tail. The long, elaborate, and ornate tail of a peacock does not have any adaptive value; it does not serve any tangible, useful purpose that would aid the survival of the peacock. In fact, it only harms its survival chances. Peacocks with longer, more elaborate trains are easier for predators to catch and kill than fellow peacocks with shorter and simpler trains. Therefore, at first sight, they only have costs and no benefits. But that according to Zahavi (1975) is precisely the point. The evolutionary psychologist Kanazawa (2010) makes this point clear in the following examples. Peacocks are advertising to peahens: “Look, I am so genetically fit and I can run so fast that I can still evade the predators with this huge thing hanging from my ass! The other guys are not so fit and the only reason they can evade predators is because their trains are shorter. They wouldn’t be able to evade the predators if their tails are as long as mine! Now whose genes would you like your offspring to carry?” And peahens indeed do prefer to mate with peacocks with longer, more elaborate, and more symmetrical tails that are biologically very expensive to maintain, so that their male offspring will also sport long, elaborate tails that attract females of their generation.

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peacock. Sometimes the message is as simple as “I have got resources to burn,” the classic conspicuous waste demonstrated by the energy expended to lift a peacocks tail or the fuel guzzled by a hummer. But brand-name products are not just about flaunting transient wealth. The audience for our signals – prospective mates, friends, and rivals – care more about the permanent traits measured in tests of intelligence and personality, as Miller explains. Furthermore, he states that much of the pleasure we derive from products stems from the unconscious instinct that they will either enhance or signal our fitness by demonstrating intelligence or some of the Big Five personality traits: openness, conscientiousness, agreeableness, stability and extraversion. In a series of experiments, Miller (2009) found that people were more likely to expend money and effort on products and activities if they were first primed with photographs of the opposite sex or stories about dating. After this priming, men were more willing to splurge on designer sunglasses, expensive watches and European vacations. Women became more willing to do volunteer work and perform other acts of conspicuous charity – a signal of high conscientiousness and agreeableness, like demonstrating your concern for the third world farmers by spending extra for Starbucks’s ‘fair trade’ coffee. The evolutionary explanation is, according to Miller (2009), that we evolved as social primates who hardly ever encountered strangers in prehistory.

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The criteria for behaviour to qualify as a costly signal are as follows (Griskevicius et al., 2007):

 It must be costly to the signaller in terms of economic resources, time, energy, risk, or some other significant domain, whereby the costlier the behaviour the more likely it is to be an honest indicator.  It must be easily observable by others.

 The display must ultimately increase the odds that the signaller will gain some fitness advantage through the display, such as increased ability to attract desirable mates.

 The signal must be an indicator to potential mates of some important trait or characteristic, such as access to resources, pro-social orientation, courage, health, or intelligence.

Thus, the costly signalling theory could be highly relevant in marketing practices, for the reason that it gives advertising practitioners tools in the creation of advertisements in order to increase effectiveness. Next, differences between men and women are discussed according to costly signalling.

Men versus Women: Sending Mixed Messages

According to Griskevicius et al. (2007), a public act of philanthropy can signal at least two clusters of important characteristics about a person: First, it can signal that an individual has resources or, at least that a person is capable of procuring resources; second, it can signal that an individual has a pro-social personality, whereby the willingness to use one’s resources to help others instead of helping only oneself suggests that a person is kind, sympathetic and helpful. Although both resource-related and pro-social traits are generally desirable in a romantic partner, their relative desirability in a mate may differ for men and women (Li et al., 2002). If so, according to Griskevicius et al. (2007), men and women may be differentially likely to display one or perhaps both traits when motivated to attract a mate. Thus, advertising practitioners could benefit from this when differentiating appeals between men and women. Next, the concepts of costly signalling are introduced.

2.2.2 Resources and Conspicuous Consumption

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status and impress others by indicating that one has enough money to purchase frivolous and wasteful goods (Griskevicius et al., 2007). For instance, although Americans donated around two billion dollar to help the victims of Hurricane Katrina, Americans spend almost two billion dollar each year to purchase and fuel their Hummers – a highly conspicuous and wasteful sports utility vehicle (Griskevicius et al., 2007). From a purely rational perspective, spending money on unnecessary and wasteful purchases as opposed to making more efficient investments might seem counterintuitive. From a costly signalling perspective, however, conspicuous consumption in humans may serve a conceptually analogues function to a peacock’s conspicuous display of his tail (Saad, 2007).

2.2.3 Pro-social Orientation and Blatant Benevolence

In addition to signalling wealth, public philanthropy can also convey pro-social personality traits (Penner and Finkelstein, 1998). Whereas conspicuous consumption may reveal a person’s selfishness and narcissism, public philanthropy may reveal virtues characteristics, such as kindness, sympathy and helpfulness (Griskevicius et al., 2007). However, one does not need to give away wads of cash to be seen as helpful. Even a poor person could do public volunteer work in the community, donate blood, or solicit donations for noble causes in a crowded mall – all of which are types of publicly visible pro-social behaviour called blatant benevolence (Griskevicius et al., 2007). Blatant benevolence is a pro-social behaviour that is costly in terms of time and effort, that is useful for publicizing one’s pro-social nature, and that is not necessarily efficient at providing aid to those in need (Griskevicius et al., 2007). For example, a wealthy venture capitalist can donate several hours of his or her time to publicly volunteer for a good cause, even though that person can use the same time to earn and donate money that would provide significantly more aid to those who need it (Griskevicius et al., 2007).

2.2.4 Costly Signalling in the Mating Context

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mating success in ancestral environments (Griskevicius et al., 2006). An evolutionary core strategy associated with successful mate-attraction is salient positive differentiation. For example, when various species of animals are approached by the opposite sex, they often engage in conspicuous displays that function both to attract the attention of the opposite sex and positively differentiate the individual from the same-sex rivals (Miller, 2000). Consistent with such animal behaviour, romantic desire in humans also appears to lead people to engage in salient public displays such as conspicuous consumption and public charity (Griskevicius et al., 2007).

Research on human mate choice suggests that the ability to procure resources ought to be used more frequently by men than women because women place considerably more emphasis on cues of wealth and status when selecting a romantic partner (Griskevicius et al., 2007). For example, women indicate that economic resources in a man are a necessity, whereas men appraise economic resources in a woman as a luxury (Li et al., 2002). Consistent with the asymmetry in preferences, mere exposure to an attractive opposite-sex individual induces men, but not women, to place a higher value on having wealth and being ambitious (Roney, 2003). Moreover, Griskevicius et al. (2007) supported their hypothesis that a romantic motive should lead men, but not necessarily women, to increase their displays of conspicuous consumption.

Furthermore, women seem to value pro-social traits in a man, possibly because such characteristics reveal a man’s willingness to invest in offspring (Griskevicius et al., 2007). On the other hand, women seem to prefer a combination of pro-social and dominance-related traits over either trait alone (Griskevicius et al., 2007). Moreover, women sometimes prefer male sexual partners who are openly competitive rather than warm and agreeable (Griskevicius et al., 2007). Such findings are also consistent with research showing that romantic motives lead women to generally become more group-oriented (Griskevicius et al., 2006). Griskevicius et al. (2007) investigated this topic and found support for the hypothesis that women are more willing for blatant benevolence in a mating context than men.

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the mating context are helpful in determining which motives lead human behaviour. If advertising practitioners are aware of these different motives, they could create advertisement in such a way that it corresponds with people’s emotions. Next, basic persuasion heuristics are discussed regarding costly signalling appeals.

2.2.5 Basic Persuasion Heuristics

Each day people are confronted with innumerable pieces of information and hundreds of decisions (Griskevicius et al., 2009). Not surprisingly, people seldom deeply process each piece of information, instead often relying on quick mental shortcuts – general heuristic rules – to guide their attitudes and behaviours (Cialdini, 2001). In line with such findings, it is no coincidence that advertising has come to use fewer lengthy logical arguments, and has instead infused ads with simple and time-tested persuasive appeals (Griskevicius et al., 2009). Such appeals capitalize on heuristic processes because these persuasive tactics are especially effective when people are not particularly motivated or capable of thinking deeply about a message (Petty and Wegener, 1998).

In relation to this, the concept of costly signalling gets more applicability for advertising in another study by Griskevicius et al. (2009). They examined how fear-inducing versus romantic contexts influenced the effectiveness of two widely used heuristics – social proof (e.g., “most popular”) and scarcity (e.g., “limited edition”). Results supported predictions from an evolutionary model, showing that fear can lead scarcity appeals to be counter-persuasive, and that romantic desire can lead social proof appeals to be counter-persuasive. This seems to be compatible with the topics in the previous paragraphs in such a way that costly signalling in a romantic context can act as scarcity appeal. In other words, “stand out from the crowd”. Therefore, the characteristics of scarcity appeals needs further attention for this study.

Scarcity Appeals

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Because a heuristic cue such as scarcity is known to increase the effectiveness of ads, sales pitches, and even appeal to engage in pro-environmental behaviour (Schultz et al., 2007), these strategies consistently appear on a short list of proven persuasion tactics in marketing, persuasion and psychology (Cialdini, 2001). But ads featuring these persuasive tactics are often preceded by some content such as a television program, which may influence the effectiveness of these appeals (Griskevicius, 2009). From an evolutionary perspective, emotions are conceived as activators of executive motivational sub-systems that direct energy in ways designed to deal with particular kinds of adaptive problems (Cosmides and Tooby, 2000). Once such a system is activated, it promotes a cascade of perceptions, cognitions, and behaviours conductive to the successful solution of the adaptive problem (Griskevicius et al., 2006, 2007). In addition, the activation of one such system can inhibit or even suppress the activation of other potentially competing systems (Brendl et al., 2003). Engaging the self-protection system, for example, can suppress attention to attractive opposite-sex individuals (Griskevicius et al., 2009). Thus, the concept of costly signalling is strengthened by the theory regarding scarcity appeals. Finally, the joint interplay of costly signalling, active motives and gender in the evaluation of advertisements, following from the literature review, is discussed.

2.2.6 Joint Interplay Costly Signalling, Active Motives and Gender in the Evaluation of Advertisements

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difference between men and women with neutral motives. The applications of this new design are more valuable for marketing professionals in comparison with the studies of Griskevicius et al. (2007, 2009). Since, it gives creators of advertisements the opportunity to differentiate between costly signals for the same product. Furthermore, emotions could be manipulated in the storyline of the advertisements.

This study investigates advertising effectiveness with the measures attitude and behaviour. It is worth notifying that there is general agreement that attitudes are learned (Schiffman and Kanuk, 2004). This means, according to Schiffman and Kanuk, 2004), that attitudes relevant to purchase behaviour are formed as a result of direct experience with the product, word-of-mouth information acquired from others, or exposure to mass-media advertising, the Internet and various forms of direct marketing. They argue that it is important to remember that although attitudes may result from behaviour, they are not synonymous with behaviour. Instead, they reflect either a favourable or an unfavourable evaluation of the attitude object. It could be expected in this study that people use their previous experiences with the advertised products. Thus, people could have previous build associations according to the way in which a product is viewed as status related (counterpart of conspicuous consumption) or pro-social related (counterpart of blatant benevolence). For that reason it is essential to test in this study for previous build associations. This study also accounted for this alternative theory. That is, the core of this study is determining advertising effectiveness for conspicuous consumption and blatant benevolence appeals. Furthermore, an alternative design is presented via a comparable analysis regarding the associations people have with products. Before turning to the conceptual model, the suspected position of the social sciences in this debate is depicted.

2.2.7 Measures of advertising effectiveness

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understanding a person’s attitude was tantamount to accurately predicting his or her behaviour. On the other hand, they showed the apparent lack of evidence to support the assumption of attitude-behaviour consistency. Furthermore, while intention and behaviour, e.g., brand choice, may often be closely related, this is not always the case (Curlo, 1992). In summary, the relationship between attitude and intended behaviour is not unambiguous in literature.

2.2.8 The Suspected Position of the Social Sciences in this Debate

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Chapter 3 Conceptual Model

A combination of the models of Griskevicius (2007, 2009) as described in the literature review, is for this study extended to an advertising context. The revealed impact of the joint interaction between costly signals, active motives and gender on the evaluation of advertisements is still not clear. Therefore, the research question in this study is: what is the impact of the joint interaction of costly signals, active motives and gender on advertising effectiveness? This study determines the relationship between costly signals, active motives, gender and measures of advertising effectiveness. In this model, attitude and intended behaviour (brand loyalty) are the measures of effectiveness. These measures are chosen because they are used as well in comparable studies (Griskevicius et al., 2009). Thus, the independent variables are conspicuous consumption and blatant benevolence appeals, the moderators are active motives and gender, and finally the dependent variable is advertising effectiveness by means of attitude and behaviour. Furthermore, to anticipate for previous build product associations in case of conspicuous consumption and blatant benevolence, their corresponding associations (i.e. status and pro-social) are added as alternative for the advertising appeals. Noted that this is not the core of the study, it is used to anticipate on unexpected results. When analysing the effects of product associations, it will also be possible to check the effects of combinations between product associations and advertising appeals. Thus, the advertising appeals as independent variables are the core of the study, and - to account for product associations - an alternative model will be tested. In case of the alternative model, the advertising appeals will be replaced as independent variables by status and pro-social associated products. Next the hypotheses are defined according to the literature review.

3.1 Hypotheses

Hypothesis 1: Costly Signalling

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effectiveness for blatant benevolence appeals if one is woman. Furthermore, neutral motives are not related to the measures of advertising effectiveness.

Hypothesis 2: Status and Pro-Social Associated Products

There is a three way interaction between product associations (i.e. status and pro-social), active motives (i.e. romantic motives and neutral motives) and gender for the measures of advertising effectiveness (i.e. attitude and behaviour). Specifically, romantic motives are positively related to the measures of advertising effectiveness for status associated products if one is man. Controversially, romantic motives are positively related to the measures of advertising effectiveness for pro-social related products if one is woman. Furthermore, neutral motives are not related to the measures of advertising effectiveness.

Hypothesis 3: Status and Pro-Social Associated Products, Strengthened by Costly Signalling Appeals

There is a three way interaction between product associations strengthened by costly signalling appeals (i.e. status/conspicuous consumption and pro-social/blatant benevolence), active motives (i.e. romantic motives and neutral motives) and gender for the measures of advertising effectiveness (i.e. attitude and behaviour). Specifically, romantic motives are positively related to the measures of advertising effectiveness for status associated products strengthened by conspicuous consumption appeals if one is man. Controversially, romantic motives are positively related to the measures of advertising effectiveness for pro-social related products strengthened by blatant benevolence appeals if one is woman. Furthermore, neutral motives are not related to the measures of advertising effectiveness.

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3.2 Independent Variables

Conspicuous consumption and blatant benevolence appeals are the independent variables in the model. According to Griskevicius et al. (2007), conspicuous consumption is defined as: “The act of spending money to gain status and impress others by indicating that one has enough money to purchase frivolous and wasteful goods.” On the other hand, blatant benevolence was defined as: “A pro-social behaviour that is costly in terms of time and effort, that is useful for publicizing one’s pro-social nature, and that is not necessarily efficient at providing aid to those in need.” The literature review showed that the appeals are effective in situations of romantic desire. The variables are operated by means of advertising appeals. In specific, an advertisement for product X could be promoted by means of status related features (e.g.: “with this exclusive watch you will impress others”) or by means of pro-social related possibilities (e.g.: “by supporting this charity fund you will show others your engagement with others”). The first appeal is related to conspicuous consumption and the second appeal to blatant benevolence. One of the key applications of this study could be that it gives creators of advertisements the ability to switch between conspicuous consumption appeals and blatant benevolence appeals for the same product.

The independent variables will be operated by eight advertisements for four products. For every product, two advertisements are built. One advertisement will promote the product by means of

Costly Signalling as Persuasion Heuristic in Advertising

Costly Signalling as Persuasion

Heuristic in Advertising

Master of Science Thesis

Merijn de Ruijter van Steveninck

Costly Signalling as Persuasion

Heuristic in Advertising

Master of Science Thesis

Merijn de Ruijter van Steveninck

December 2010

Management Summary

Contents

Preface

Chapter 1

Introduction

Chapter 2

Literature Review

Chapter 3

Conceptual Model