A cross cultural pragmatic analysis of commercial advertisements in american and vietnamese magazines

The purpose of this dissertation is to examine the use of politenessstrategies, advertising appeals and the realization of politeness strategies inadvertising appeals in American and Vie

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF

POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

DO THI PHUONG MAI

A CROSS-CULTURAL PRAGMATIC ANALYSIS OF COMMERCIAL ADVERTISEMENTS IN AMERICAN AND

VIETNAMESE MAGAZINES

(Nghiên cứu dụng học giao văn hóa về quảng cáo

thương mại trên tạp chí Mĩ và Việt)

Major: English Linguistics Code: 9220201.01

A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment

of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy

Hanoi - 2018

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF

POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

DO THI PHUONG MAI

A CROSS-CULTURAL PRAGMATIC ANALYSIS OF COMMERCIAL ADVERTISEMENTS IN AMERICAN AND

VIETNAMESE MAGAZINES

(Nghiên cứu dụng học giao văn hóa về quảng cáo

thương mại trên tạp chí Mĩ và Việt)

Major: English Linguistics Code: 9220201.01

Supervisor

Prof Dr Nguyen Quang

Hanoi - 2018

I certify that the thesis I have presented for examination for the Doctor ofPhilosophy degree at the University of Languages and International Studies,Vietnam National University, Hanoi, is solely my own work other than where Ihave clearly indicated that it is the works of others

The copyright of this thesis rests with the author Quotation from it ispermitted, provided that full acknowledgement is made This thesis may not bereproduced without my prior written consent

I warrant that this authorization does not, to the best of my belief, infringethe rights of any third party

Hanoi, 2018Signature

Do Thi Phuong Mai

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The purpose of this dissertation is to examine the use of politenessstrategies, advertising appeals and the realization of politeness strategies inadvertising appeals in American and Vietnamese commercial magazineadvertisements The data for this study consist of 310 magazine advertisementscollected within a period of six months at the end of 2014 These advertisementsare analyzed on the basis of Brown and Levinson’s (1987) politeness theory andPollay’s (1983) advertising appeal system The results reveal the preferences inthe use of positive politeness strategies in both American and Vietnamese

advertisements Additionally, Effectiveness, Distinctive and Modern are the three

most popular appeals in selected advertisements Another similarity betweenAmerican and Vietnamese magazine advertising is the realization of positive

politeness strategies in Effectiveness appeal However, there exist the differences

in the use of politeness strategies and advertising appeals between American andVietnamese advertising At the same time, the manifestation of some politenessstrategies, advertising appeals, and the realization of certain politeness strategies

in advertising appeals in American advertising is different from that ofVietnamese advertising The findings of the study, therefore, suggest thatappropriate advertising strategies be employed to achieve the goal of theadvertisements

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I would like first and foremost to extend my most sincere thanks toProfessor Nguyễn Quang, my supervisor, for his critical comments and valuableinstructions without which this thesis could not have been completed I doappreciate his kind encouragement, astute advice and immeasurable guidanceand support through every stage of my Ph.D journey

My indebtedness also goes to lecturers of University of Languages andInternational Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi, for their immenselyhelpful guidance and support during my time of study therein

I am also grateful to my colleagues at Faculty of English, Hanoi National University of Education for their support throughout the process of writing this thesis.

Last but not least, I am especially indebted to my beloved family memberswhose help and encouragements contributed greatly to the completion of my study

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 1.1 Pollay’s appeal system, 1983 13

Table 1.2 Classification of advertising appeals 15

Table 2.1 American and Vietnamese magazines used in the study 47

Table 2.2 Research framework for politeness strategies in the study 52

Table 2.3 Single bald-on record strategies in the study 53

Table 2.4 Single positive politeness strategies in the study 55

Table 2.5 Single negative politeness strategies in the study 55

Table 2.6 Single off-record politeness strategies in the study 56

Table 2.7 Mixed politeness strategies in the study 56

Table 2.8 Result of pilot test on Pollay’s system 58

Table 2.9 Five newly-added advertising appeals (Shen, 2013) 59

Table 2.10 Advertising appeals in the study 60

Table 2.11 Elements in the research design 64

Table 3.1 Frequency of politeness strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 66

Table 3.2 Frequency of single positive politeness strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 69

Table 3.3 Frequency of single negative politeness strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 83

Table 3.4 Bald-on record strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 90

Table 3.5 Similarities and differences in politeness strategies used in American and Vietnamese magazine advertisements 99

Table 4.1 Advertising appeals in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 102

Table 4.2 Similarities and differences in the use of advertising appeals in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 124

Table 5.1 Summary of the realization of politeness strategies in advertising appeals in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 147

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1.1 Marketing mix 10

Figure 1.2 Promotion mix 10

Figure 1.3 Why Politeness?, adapted from Nguyễn Quang (2011) 17

Figure 1.4 Lakoff (1973)’s rules of pragmatic competence 19

Figure 1.5 Leech cost-benefit scale (1983) 20

Figure 1.6 Possible strategies concerning the delivery of an FTA (Brown and Levinson, 1987: 69) 21

Figure 2.1 Possible strategies concerning the delivery of an FTA, Nguyễn Quang (2012), adapted from Brown and Levinson (1987) 57

Figure 2.2 Data analysis procedure 63

Figure 5.1: Proportion of politeness strategies realized in advertising appeals in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 126

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION i

ABSTRACT ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iii

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS iv

LIST OF TABLES v

LIST OF FIGURES vi

INTRODUCTION 1

CHAPTER 1 REVIEW OF LITERATURE 7

1.1 Advertising 7

1.2 Advertising appeals 11

1.3 Politeness 16

1.3.1 Definition 18

1.3.2 Approaches to politeness 18

1.3.3 Concluding remarks 31

1.4 Politeness and advertising 33

1.5 Review of previous studies 35

1.5.1 Previous studies of advertising from cross-cultural pragmatic perspective 35

1.5.2 Previous studies of advertising appeals 42

1.5.3 Concluding remarks 44

CHAPTER 2 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 45

2.1 Research questions 45

2.2 Samples 45

2.2.1 Selection of the magazines 47

2.2.2 Selection of advertisements 47

2.3 Collection procedure 48

2.4 Coding 49

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2.5 Research frameworks 50

2.5.1 Politeness 50

2.5.2 Advertising appeals 57

2.6 Data analysis 60

CHAPTER 3 POLITENESS STRATEGIES IN AMERICAN AND VIETNAMESE COMMERCIAL MAGAZINE ADVERTISEMENTS 65

3.1 Frequency of politeness strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 65

3.2 Single positive politeness strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 68

3.2.1 Frequency of single positive politeness strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 68

3.2.2 Linguistic realization of single positive politeness strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 70

3.3 Single negative politeness strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 83

3.3.1 Frequency of single negative politeness strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 83

3.3.2 Linguistic realization of single negative politeness strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 87

3.4 Bald-on record strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 89

3.4.1 Frequency of bald-on record strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 89

3.4.2 Linguistic realization of bald-on record strategies in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 93

3.5 The hybrid negative-positive politeness strategy in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 95

3.6 Concluding remarks 97

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CHAPTER 4 ADVERTISING APPEALS IN AMERICAN AND

VIETNAMESE COMMERCIAL MAGAZINE ADVERTISEMENTS 101

4.1 Frequency of advertising appeals in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 101

4.2 Linguistic realization of advertising appeals in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 109

4.2.1 Linguistic realization of Effectiveness appeal in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 109

4.2.2 Linguistic realization of Distinctive appeal in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements 115

4.3 Concluding remarks 122

CHAPTER 5 REALIZATION OF POLITENESS STRATEGIES IN ADVERTISING APPEALS IN AMERICAN AND VIETNAMESE COMMERCIAL MAGAZINE ADVERTISEMENTS .

5.1 Realization of positive politeness strategies in advertising appeals

5.2 Realization of negative politeness strategies in advertising appeals

5.3 Realization of bald-on record politeness strategies in advertising appeals 139 5.4 Realization of mixed politeness strategies in advertising appeals

CONCLUSION

1 Recapitulation of the study

2 Implication

3 Limitations

4 Suggestions for further studies

REFERENCES

APPENDIXES

APPENDIX 1: POLITENESS STRATEGY FRAMEWORK

APPENDIX 2: ADVERTISING APPEAL FRAMEWORK

APPENDIX 3: SELECTED ADVERTISEMENTS IN THE STUDY

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1 Rationale for the study

In today’s world of consumerism, advertising plays a significant role in

that “it [advertising] creates needs, more needs and entices the consumer”

(Jurgensen, 2006: 9) The advertising market is so cunning that it transformssimple shirts, bags, shoes or sneakers into precious objects In order to do so, ad-writers have used a variety of techniques to make their products more appealing

to their consumers They have applied both textual and non-textual methods,including all kinds of visual and linguistic tricks in order to persuade theiraudience An ideal advertisement, as Chow (2010) explains, must draw attention,arouse interest, stimulate desire, create conviction, and above all, get action

Shimp & Andrew (2013) argue that most consumer behaviors are swayed byemotions rather than rationality As a result, when forming the language ofadvertising, ad-writers normally resort to two major advertising approaches, namely

“soft-sell” appeal (or indirect advertising) and “hard-sell” appeal (or directadvertising) (Mueller, 1986) Additionally, with regard to other interlocutor’semotions, rapport may be the most essential factor determining the attraction andsustainment of their involvement in communication Advertisers, therefore, apply avariety of strategies to guarantee the rapport with their potential consumers, ofwhich politeness strategies are one of the most popular ones

The study of politeness in advertising text is of interest to many linguists

as the language used by ad-writers must be careful in order not to offend theprospective customers and at the same time successfully in persuading thesecustomers to buy the products or use the services advertised There have beenrelatively few studies on politeness and advertising nationally andinternationally Such research includes studies by Mai Xuân Huy (2005), Hồ Vi

Nữ Mỹ Linh (2011), Ngũ Thiện Hùng (2011), Hardin (1997; 2001), Escribano

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(2006), Stehlik (2007), Wise (2011), to name a few There are also certain studiescomparing the expression of politeness in advertising in two languages, forexample Koga and Pearson (1992), Gas & Neru (2006), Wise (2011) orHermosilla (2012) However, there have not been sufficient studies on politenessstrategies in American and Vietnamese advertising.

Furthermore, thanks to the globalization of the world marketplace,international advertising segment has been expanding (Tomkins, 2000).Therefore, it is significant that advertisers understand cultural universals andexclusions that tend to condition advertising appeals in different markets.Cultural difference is an important factor in understanding internationaladvertising successfully (Keegan, 1989) because consumers growing up in aparticular culture are accustomed to a specific culture (Zhang & Gelb, 1996) Inother words, advertising is culture-oriented discipline as it is based on languageand other communication tools which are deeply rooted in the given culture of asociety (Shutte & Ciarlante, 1998) Particularly, advertising communicatescultural values through advertising appeals (Pollay, 1983) because ad-writersoften refer to cultural values when they have to select the primary advertisingappeals Based on this view, a larger number of cross-cultural studies haveexamined similarities or differences in cultural values embedded in advertisingcontents Typical examples include Cheng and Schweitzer (1996), Albers-Millerand Stafford (1999), Lin (2009, Shen (2013), and Sar & Rodriguez (2014) whoemploy content analysis to see the cross-national differences in advertisingstrategy However, to the best of the author’s knowledge, virtually no study hasfocused on the potential relationship between politeness and advertising appeals.Consequently, this study employs Brown and Levinson (1987)’s politenesstheory and Pollay (1983)’s advertising appeal conceptual framework to examinehow American and Vietnamese advertising differ from each other in the use ofpoliteness strategies and advertising appeals

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2 Aim and objectives of the study

The overall aim of the study is to pragmatically provide a study onpoliteness strategies, advertising appeals, as well as the realization of politenessstrategies in advertising appeals in American and Vietnamese commercialmagazine advertisements

In order to achieve this aim, the objectives set out for the study are:

to find out what politeness strategies and advertising appeals are used in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements;

to examine how politeness strategies are realized in advertising appeals

in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements;

to discuss the similarities and differences in the use of politenessstrategies, advertising appeals, and the realization of politeness strategies

in advertising appeals in American and Vietnamese commercial magazineadvertisements from cross-cultural pragmatic perspective

3 How are politeness strategies realized in advertising appeals in

American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements?

4 Scope of the study

The aim of this study is to examine politeness strategies and advertisingappeals used in American and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements

It attempts to investigate the similarities and differences between American andVietnamese magazine advertisements’ preference of politeness strategies andadvertising appeals, which reflects the influence of American and Vietnamese

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cultures on advertisers’ choices for such phenomena According to Trehan (2006:120), an advertisement consists of headlines, subheads, illustrations, slogans, text

or body-copy, blurbs, boxes or panels, identification marks, and closing ideas.However, since it is impossible to cover every single aspect of an advertisement,this study focuses on intra-linguistic factors only Consequently, paralinguisticand extra-linguistic factors are out of the scope of this study

Another noteworthy point is that many other issues related to commercialadvertisements such as the rhetorical features of advertising language or theadvertising strategies also fall out of the scope of the research

5 Significance of the study

This work is important for different reasons Theoretically, the studycontributes to an investigation into some research areas in Vietnam on linguisticpoliteness and advertising appeals Additionally, the study’s findings areexpected to reinforce or deny existing hypotheses in the fields and to bring about

a better insight into the issues of linguistic politeness and advertising appeals inadvertising

From a practical perspective, this research work is expected to contribute

to an enhanced understanding of how advertisers from the two cultures employpoliteness strategies and advertising appeals in magazine advertisements Moreimportantly, it is hoped that as a cross-cultural pragmatic study, the research canprovide advertisers and practitioners sufficient details and specific examples tohelp them appropriately use politeness strategies and advertising appeals indifferent cultures

From a methodological point of view, this study seeks to explore theextent to which Brown and Levinson’s (1978, 1987) theory of politenessstrategies and Pollay’s (1983) advertising appeal framework are applicable toother languages and cultures

From a pedagogical perspective, the findings of the study can serve as avaluable reference for schools and other educational institutions in establishing

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their educational programs about advertising, politeness strategies andadvertising appeals It is also important that the study contributes to raisingfaculty and students’ awareness and appreciation of cultural differences.

6 Methodology

To answer the three research questions mentioned, the present studylooked at both quantitative and qualitative dimensions of data, but focusedmainly on qualitative from a cross-cultural pragmatic approach Specifically, 310advertisements taken from six different American and Vietnamese magazines areanalyzed based on two research frameworks, Brown and Levinson’s (1987)politeness theory and Pollay’s (1983) advertising appeals Additionally, contentanalysis is employed as a research technique for the study Owing to thesemethods and techniques, American and Vietnamese advertisements taken fromAmerican and Vietnamese commercial magazines within a period of six months

at the end of 2014 were analyzed to figure out the similarities and differences inthe use of politeness strategies and advertising appeals as well as the realization

of politeness strategies in advertising appeals The methodology is presented atlength in Chapter 2 of the thesis

7 Structure of the study

The present study is divided into three main parts, as follows:

The first part, Introduction, gives the reader an overview of the studythrough the rationale for the study Other issues clarified in this section areresearch aim and objectives, research questions, scope, significance, andmethodology A summary of all the parts and chapters is also presented in thestructure of the study to help the audience have an overall idea of the study

The second part of the study consists of five chapters which present themajor issues of the thesis

Chapter 1 presents a theoretical background and literature review in the light

of cross-cultural pragmatics It begins with an introduction to basic terminologies,concepts, and approaches which are used in the two research frameworks of the

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research Then, up-to-date relevant studies of advertising from cross-culturalpragmatic perspective and studies on advertising appeals are discussed.

Chapter 2 addresses the methodology of the present study In this chapter,samples of the study, data collection procedures, research frameworks and dataanalysis instruments are presented

Chapter 3, 4, and 5 present and discuss the research results in response tothe three research questions posed in the study, including the analyses ofpoliteness strategies, advertising appeals, and how politeness strategies arerealized in advertising appeals In particular, chapter 3 presents and discusses thefindings on the frequency and linguistic manifestation of politeness strategies inAmerican and Vietnamese commercial magazine advertisements It thencompares and contrasts the use of politeness strategies in American andVietnamese commercial magazine advertisements Chapter 4 discusses thefindings on the frequency, linguistic manifestation, as well as similarities anddifferences of advertising appeals in American and Vietnamese advertising.Chapter 5 focuses on the way that politeness strategies are realized in advertisingappeals and the similarities and differences in the realization of politenessstrategies in advertising appeals in American and Vietnamese advertising Thefindings and discussions in these three chapters are based on cross-culturalpragmatic perspective

Finally, the part of Conclusion summarizes the major findings and theresearch work performed It also provides recommendations as to how this studycan contribute to the current literature on advertising research, to cross-culturalpragmatic analysis, as well as to education Finally, limitations of the study andsuggestions for further studies are also presented

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CHAPTER 1 REVIEW OF LITERATURE

Chapter 1 aims at establishing the theoretical framework underlying thepresent study and locating the present study within linguistic research in general.The chapter firstly gives an account of the basic concepts and major approaches

in politeness and advertising appeal theories It then reviews the previous studies

of cross-cultural pragmatics and advertising appeals which are relevant to thecurrent research Finally, a brief summary of the fundamental literature locatingthe gap to be filled by the present study is provided

1.1 Advertising

1.1.1 Definitions

“Advertere,” a Latin word meaning to warn or to call attention to, is theroot of the word “advertise.” There are a variety of definitions of advertising

Dyer (1982) defines advertising as a means of “drawing attention to

something, notifying or informing somebody of something This act can be done

by words of mouth to an individual or to a group of people.” However, if there

are a large number of people to be introduced about something, advertisement –public announcement – might be used

According to Bovee & Arens (1992), advertising is “the non-personal communication of information usually paid for and usually persuasive in nature about products, services or ideas by identified sponsors through the various media."

From Dyan (1995)’s point of view, advertising is the paid, impersonal,one-way marketing of persuasive information from an identified sponsordisseminated through channels of mass communication to promote the adoption

of goods, services or ideas

Based on the above definitions and from the author’s perspective,advertising is informing a large group of people about a product or service via

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different advertisements in order to attract their attention and then encourage them

to do some actions like buying a product, using the service, or doing charity

1.1.2 Classification

Advertising can be classified based on different criteria The followingclassification is based on Bovee & Arens (1992)’s as their typology is exhaustiveand comprehensible

In terms of media, advertising includes print advertising (newspapers andmagazines), broadcast advertising (radio and television), out-of-home advertising(outdoor and transit advertising), and direct-mail advertising

With regard to geographic area, it consists of international advertising,which aims at foreign market; national advertising targeting at customers inseveral regions of the country; regional advertising used for advertising productswhich are sold in one area or region and local advertising which is directed atcustomers from only one city or local trading area

As far as target audience is concerned, consumer advertising and businessadvertising can be named The classification of advertisements by targetaudience is strongly tied to the purpose of the advertisements as the purpose ofthe advertisement determines its target audience The manufacturer of anyproduct usually determines the purpose of the products The position of theproduct in the product life circle also determines the purpose of theadvertisement Therefore, different forms of advertisement suit the differentstages of the product life circle

Action advertising and awareness advertising are two kinds ofadvertising based on consumer response Action advertising is often used innewspapers or magazines in order to provoke an immediate action on the part ofthe reader Such advertisements contain telephone numbers and/or links towebsites where the customer can get additional information or order theadvertised product Awareness advertising, on the other hand, attempts to build

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the image of a given product, to create interest in the product and to influencepeople to choose and become loyal towards a certain brand.

Product advertising and non-product advertising are two advertising typeswhen considering the advertising objects Product advertising is aimed at promotinggoods or services whereas non-product advertising aims at selling ideas to affectpeople's awareness of and attitudes to organizations and their activities Thiscategory includes advertisements for charities and political parties

In terms of purposes, commercial advertising and non-commercialadvertising can be classified In this way of classification, commercialadvertising promotes goods, services, or ideas of a business with the expectation

of making a profit So as to achieve the commercial purposes, ad-writers have tomake great efforts in attracting consumers On the other hand, non-commercialadvertising has such functions as recruitment, promotion of public health orencouraging charity donations The focus of this study is on commercialadvertising in the print medium namely magazines

1.1.3 Significance

Advertising is firstly a marketing norm According to marketing theory,there are four significant factors that a company or a business should and mustcontrol, including product, price, place, and promotion (The four Ps) These fourfactors together create the so-called marketing mix Among these four elements,promotion consists of advertising, personal selling, publicity and salespromotion According to Pride (1990), advertising is the most important tool inimproving sales and interest Figures 1.1 and 1.2 can illustrate the position androle of advertising in marketing (Pride, 1990)

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Price

Place

Figure 1.1 Marketing mix, Pride (1990) Figure 1.2 Promotion mix, Pride (1990)

Additionally, advertising is acknowledged as the engine that drives

consumers purchase and therefore, it “keeps the wheels of the economy turning”

(Rodgers & Thorson, 2012) The most outstanding function of adverting is tointroduce a wide range of goods to the public and thus to support thedevelopment of the market economy All in all, advertising plays an importantrole in the modern society

1.1.4 Characteristics of advertising language

In order to attract the audience, advertising language should be inaccordance with the criteria of an effective act of verbal communication whichincludes six language roles stated by Jakobson (1960, cited in Sebeok, 1960:350- 377) as follows:

 Referential function: describes a situation, an object, or a mental state and is oriented toward the context

 Emotive function: adds the information about the internal state of the speaker and orientates toward the addresser

 Conative function: engages the addressee directly and is represented in imperatives and vocatives

 Phatic function: establishes, discontinues, or prolongs the

communication

 Meta-lingual function: describes and discusses the language itself

 Poetic function: focuses on the message for its own sake

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Among the six roles mentioned, the conative and referential functions are

of great importance in advertising as they are intended to get people to act in away the advertiser desires These roles are also in line with Pollay’s (1983)advertising appeals which are discussed in detail in the following part

1.2 Advertising appeals

1.2.1 Advertising appeals

Appeals can be understood in different ways According to Wells, Burnettsand Moritaty (1995), appeals are something that makes the product particularlyattractive or interesting to the consumer Appeals are closely related to products’attributes in the way that they are created to represent the supposed values of theadvertised products

Appeals are classified in different ways Kotler (1997) differentiates threetypes of appeals; namely, rational appeals, emotional appeals and moral appeals

In this way of classification, Rational appeals are the ones which appeal to the

audience’s self-interest Consequently, they are involved in quality, value or

performance of the product Emotional appeals attempt to stir up negative or

positive emotions and include fear, guilty and joy The last type of appeals

named Moral appeals refers to the audience’s sense of what is right or proper.

Therefore, they include such appeals as ecological appeals or nationalism Thisway of classification is somewhat similar to advertising values which aremanifested in advertising messages

Another way of classifying advertising appeals is based on the overalllevel as either rational or emotional (Laskey, Fox, and Crask, 1995) The idea ofrational versus emotional appeals originally came from Copeland’s (1924, cited

in Albers-Miller, N D., & Stafford, 1999) proposition that for either rational oremotional reasons, individuals buy products Rational advertising derives fromtraditional information processing models of decision making in which the

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consumer tried to make logical and rational decisions Therefore, theseadvertising appeals are related to the audience’s self-interest, and they showproduct benefits such as product’s quality, economy, value or performance.Meanwhile, emotional appeals are closely related to the emotional, experientialside of consumption, i.e., ad-writers seek to make the consumers feel good aboutthe product, by creating a likeable or friendly brand, they rely on feelings foreffectiveness The author of the study is in favor of this classification as it iscomprehensible and appropriate for the study.

1.2.2 Pollay’s appeal system and its application to the present study

Pollay (1983) proposes a framework of 42 advertising appeals drawn fromthe review of a variety of related previous research to measure cultural valuesembedded in advertising He also shows that advertising reflects a somewhatdifferent set of values that can be found in the society in general Therefore,advertising may have only positive appeals related to products, but such negativeappeals like fear or guilty are depicted as safety appeals in Pollay’s framework

Pollay’s framework is considered the most complete set of advertisingappeals with definition to many scholars (Dahl, 2002) It is also an exhaustivecategory scheme of the entire advertising appeals and has been tested andvalidated by several empirical studies like Albers (1994), Cheng (1997), andHarwood & Roy (1999)

Conceptual definitions of Pollay’s appeals are described as in Table 1.1

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40 Community

41. Health

42 Neat

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Pollay’s advertising appeals can be categorized on an overall level aseither rational or emotional as stated in Albers-Miller and Stafford (1999).

Table 1.2 Classification of advertising appeals

(Albers-Miller and Stafford, 1999)

Rational

Effectiveness Convenience Cheap Technology Productivity Durability Natural Modern Wisdom Safety Health Tamed Independence Neat

Although Pollay’s (1983) advertising appeal system is considered to becomprehensive and reliable, it has also been criticized Because of the Americanorigin of Pollay’s appeals (1983), some scholars like Zhang (2014) or De Mooij(2015) have questioned the applicability of Pollay’s 42 appeals in other culturalcontexts Additionally, research of Albers-miller & Stafford (1999) and Albers-Miller &Straughan (2000) reveals that in a service context, certain Pollay’sadvertising appeals are not meaningful These researchers, therefore, clarify thatonly 16 appeals in Pollay’s list are emotional and service related The lastcriticism on Pollay’s advertising appeal system relies on its excessive number ofvalue items (Zhang & Harwood, 2004) Consequently, many researchers havetestified Pollay’s taxonomy to select the most appropriate advertising appeals(Cheng, 1997; Cheng & Schweitzer, 1996; Ji & McNeal, 2001; Lin, 2009)

The author of this study shares the ideas that Pollay’s framework is morecomprehensive than other schemes of the same category thanks to itscomprehensiveness, relevance, analytical ability, and also reliability.Additionally, Pollay’s list of appeals is unique in the way that it derives from

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previous studies and it has been successfully used in such cross-cultural studieseven outside the Western advertising culture (Dahl, 2002) like the present study.

1.3 Politeness

Politeness is a phenomenon that has been drawing a lot of attention inrecent years Many researchers such as Lakoff (1973), Leech (1983), Brown andLevinson (1978, 1987), Frasers (1990), Watts (1992) have postulated differenttheories on politeness Politeness is so popular that almost everyone perceives it

as natural when communicating Thomas (1995) even states that it almost can beconsidered a pragmatic discipline

According to Nguyễn Quang (2011), as human beings, we are endowedwith double nature, the social being which helps interact with each other likeother species in the animal kingdom and the conscious being which allows us tothink Thanks to social interaction and thinking, human beings develop self-concept and other-concept During the process of recognizing self-concept andother-concept, individuals realize that they are not only specific individuals butalso members of different groups in society In other words, each person hasdouble status, membership and individualship Then in everyday life, peoplecarry out communicative acts, thus the demand to be polite in communicationappears To satisfy their positive face, people employ positive politeness.Similarly, negative politeness appears to ensure people’s negative face At thesame time, positive politeness serves to satisfy people’s membership whilenegative politeness is to enhance individualship Moreover, politeness is there tomaintain social harmony In other words, it can be said that politeness is theproduct of social order and the precondition of human cooperation Thefollowing figure adapted from Nguyễn Quang (2011) will illustrate the point:

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Human beings

Social beings Conscious beings

Self-concept and other-concept

Being members Being individuals

Positive face Negative face

Positive politeness Negative politeness

Satisfying membership Satisfying individualship

Social harmony

Figure 1.3 Why Politeness?, adapted from Nguyễn Quang (2011)

The following part discusses in detail various definitions, approaches topoliteness, general concepts in contemporary politeness theories and therelationship between politeness and advertising

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1.3.1 Definition

Politeness is such a popular notion that it has been defined by a greatnumber of researchers all over the world However, it is hard to find a uniformdefinition for politeness as politeness differs from one culture to another

Etymologically, politeness was described as:

“… derived from the Latin „politus‟, past participle of „polire‟ meaning „to smooth.‟ Thus, „polite‟ original meant „smoothed,‟ „polished,‟ and subsequently „refined,‟ „cultivated,‟ „well bred,‟ and so on when referring to people and „courteous,‟ „urban‟ etc when referring to manners.” (Sifianou,

1992: 81 cited in Miriam A Locher, 2004: 89)

As can be seen from the aforementioned definition, politeness is associated withthe behavior of the upper classes, the urban life and civilized manners as well asforms of social behaviors

From the normative perspective, Hill et al (1986: 349) defines politeness

as “one of the constraints on human‟s interaction, whose purpose is to consider

others‟ feelings, establish levels of mutual comfort, and promote rapport.”

From the strategic point of view, it is defined as “the means employed to

show awareness of another person‟s face” (Yule, 1997: 60), or the strategies

used to minimize the face threat of the face-threatening act (Brown andLevinson, 1987)

From the communicative approach, Nguyễn Quang (2004: 11) considers

politeness as “any communicative act (verbal and/or non-verbal) that is intentionally and appropriately meant to make another/ others feel better or less bad.”

The author of this study is in favor of Nguyễn Quang (2004)’sconceptualization and functionally take politeness as making people feel good

1.3.2 Approaches to politeness

There are a variety of politeness theories proposed in the light ofpragmatics since the late 1970s However, four current theories to thephenomenon can be traced, namely the conversational-maxim view, the face-saving view, the social-norm view, and conversational-contract view

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1.3.2.1 The conversational-maxim approach

The conversational-maxim approach is influenced by Grice’s cooperativeprinciples (1975) which include four famous conversational maxims, namelyquantity (be informative), quality (be true), relation (be relevant) and manner (beclear) According to Grice (1975), other maxims such as politeness maxim canalso be added to the cooperative principle Basing on that, such authors as Lakoff(1973) and Leech (1983) suggest two sets of politeness rules

Lakoff (in Eelen, 2001: 2) defines politeness as “a system of interpersonal

relations designed to facilitate interaction by minimizing the potential for conflict and confrontation inherent in all human interchange.” She, therefore,

suggests two sets of politeness rules named Be clear and Be polite The first set

is similar to Grice’s cooperative principle while the second one has three rules:

(1) Don’t impose, (2) Offer optionality, and (3) Encourage feelings of

camaraderie Her theory can be summarized as follows:

Pragmatic competenceRules of politeness

Rules of conversation (Grice’s principles)

Figure 1.4 Lakoff (1973)’s rules of pragmatic competence

However, Lakoff (1973)’s politeness theory has been criticized by suchresearchers as Brown (1998) in that she does not offer a theory of politenesswithin which her rules can be framed This problem was more clearly stated by

Marquez (2000: 8) that “when it comes to reformulation of her (Lakoff‟s) rules

of politeness, she does not provide a definition of the terms she uses, instead, she appears to equate formality with aloofness, camaradie with showing sympathy.”

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Sharing the same point of view, Watts et al.(1992: 6) point out that “[w]e are

never told explicitly how these three levels of politeness are to be understood, nor…what politeness itself is.”

Leech (1983) adopts Grice’s cooperative principles and constructs a modelincluding politeness maxims and a set of rules He introduces the politenessprinciple acting under the principle of minimizing the impolite expressions andmaximizing polite expressions This politeness principle consists of six maximslike tact maxim, generosity maxim, approbation maxim, modesty maxim,agreement maxim and sympathy maxim Leech recognizes that some maximstend to be more highly valued in certain societies over the others He points out,

for example, that Chinese people tend to value Modesty more than Britain do

whereas Tact maxim is probably the most significant kind of politeness inEnglish-speaking countries He additionally proposes a cost-benefit scale toillustrate the relationship between and S and H when a speech act is performed

as in the following figure:

Figure 1.5 Leech cost-benefit scale (1983)

The scale shows that the greater the cost to the hearer, the greater impoliteness ofthe act and the greater the benefit to the hearer, the greater the politeness of theact

Leech’s theory is criticized by certain scholars like Watts et al (1992),Turner (1996), or Marquer (2000) Watts et al (1992: 6) and Turner (1996: 6)criticize that Leech’s concept lack both an explicit definition and an indefinite

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1.3.2.2 The face- saving approach: Brown and Levinson’s theory

A major approach to politeness referenced by many previousstudies is undoubtedly Brown and Levinson’s theory (1978, 1987) whichconsists of three notions: face, face-threatening act (FTA) and politeness

strategy In Brown and Levinson’s (1987) point of view, face is “the

public self-image that every member wants to claim for himself.” In

other words, face refers to a speaker’s sense of linguistic and social

identity They assume that there are two types of face, positive andnegative face Positive face refers to an individual’s desire to beappreciated by others in order to have his/ her wants to be considereddesirable whereas negative face is one’s desire to be unimpeded in his/her actions

Brown and Levinson assume that, during an interaction, certainkinds of acts are threatening to the face and therefore, need softening.Consequently, they propose the notion face-threatening act that threatenspeople’s face So as to soften these face-threatening acts, they introducecertain strategies as in Figure 1.6

lesser

Do the FTAs

5 Don’t do the FTAs

greater

i

gure 1.6 Possible strategies concerning the delivery

of an FTA (Brown and Levinson, 1987: 69)

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According to Brown and Levinson (1987), a FTA can be performed either

on or off record

The bald on-record strategy is the most direct strategy It does nothing tominimize threats to the hearer’s face To perform the disagreement directlywithout any softening devices, the speaker may use certain negation markers like

“no” accompanied by different paralinguistic features such as word stress, loudvolume or lengthened vowels This strategy is preferred among people whoknow each other very well in a very comfortable environment

The positive politeness strategies are the ones that oriented towards thepositive face of the hearer by indicating or presupposing in some way that thespeaker wants what the hearer’s wants (Brown and Levinson, 1987) In order to

do so, the addressee should be treated as a member of an in-group, a friend, aperson whose personality trait is known; therefore, this involves the use ofexpressions of solidarity, informality and familiarity Fifteen positive politenessstrategies outlined by Brown and Levinson (1987) and examples of positivepoliteness strategies cited from Watts (2003) and Nguyễn Quang (2003) arepresented as follows

The first type of positive politeness strategy is Notice, attend to hearers

concern for H’s wants as a way of indicating cooperation as in the followingexample:

Wow, how smart you look today! What occasion? By the way, can I

borrow 50,000 VND if you have?

The second type is named Exaggerate (interest, approval, sympathy with

H) This strategy softens the impending FTA by creating a friendly environment,

specifically using emphatic expressions such as “really,” “absolutely,” or

“exactly.” For example:

Good old Jim Just the man I wanted to see I knew I‟d find you here Could you spare me a couple of minutes?

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