Pas de Français, English please? An experimental study on the effect of language choice and product type in product advertisements on the attitude and purchase intention of balanced bilingual Canadians.

Abstract

The question for multinationals often is whether to standardize their advertising by using English or adapt their advertising by using the local language or a mixture of both languages. Previous research applied the Communication Accommodation Theory (CAT) by investigating whether adapting the advertisement’s language to the targeted bilingual ingroup’s language led to favorable evaluations of the adapted advertisement. According to existing literature, ethnocentricity explains the degree to which one favours the in-group over the out-group. Research focusing on advertising (including language and product type) for Canadian balanced bilinguals is limited, and therefore the current study focuses on advertising to this target group. The present study aimed to investigate the influence of language choice and product type in product advertising, and their interaction, but also the effect of ethnocentricity, on the attitude and purchase intention of balanced bilingual Canadians.