Aaker’s Brand Personality Scale in a French Context: A Replication and a Preliminary Test of Its Validity

Abstract

This article aims to replicate Aaker's research on the dimensions of brand personality. Our study relies on a convenience sample and deals with twelve brands purchased in a French context. By means of principal components and confirmatory factor analyses, Aaker's scale can be reduced in France to 33 items. Its structure is quite similar to the structure Aaker found in an American environment. IntroductionThe adventurous life of a cow-boy in the wilderness is a typical example of the image and the personality a brand like Marlboro seeks to forge, particularly through advertising. Surprisingly, although the study of personality is very old, almost no research was centered on the specific components of the personality associated with brands. Aaker's recent study ( 1997) is, in this respect, an exception and a major contribution.The possibility of extending this American study to the French context was explored. The following questions were thus addressed. Will the same number of factors indicated in Aaker's study be found in a French context? Do the French factors mean the same or on the contrary, do they have a different meaning?In order to answer these questions, this article is articulated around three complementary sections. In the first section, the literature on human personality and its transposition to brands are synthesized. After a description of the data collection procedure, the methodology used in this research, relying mainly on exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses is detailed in a second section. Finally, results are displayed and discussed in a third section, underlining the main theoretical as well as managerial contributions. In the conclusion, re-search limits are pointed out and relevant directions for future research are suggested.

Sport club brand personality scale (SCBPS): A new brand personality scale for sport clubs

“…First, we empirically validated the scale only in Germany. Previous research on brand personality suggests that cultural adjustments might be necessary (Ferrandi et al, 2000;Aaker et al, 2001;Venable et al, 2005). Further research is needed to investigate the factor structure and stability of the SCBPS in different cultural areas.…”

Identity-Based Brand Management

“…for instance Aaker et al 2001;Ferrandi et al 2000;Supphellen and Gronhaug 2003). Instead it became clear that different dimensions have to be chosen for different countries and product categories (cf.…”

From brands in general to retail brands: A review and future agenda for brand personality measurement

“…Different sources of inference of perception of brand personality across different product categories may have been responsible for this phenomenon. Aaker's (1997) scale had been developed in USA, but it has been applied in different countries and cultures, like France (Ferrandi, Valette-Florence & Fine-Falcy, 2000;Koebel & Ladwein, 1999), Japan (Aaker et al, 2001), Spain (Aaker et al, 2001) and Germany (Hieronimus, 2003;Richter, Langer & Eisend, 2005). Aaker (1997) advocated that the brand personality scale is influenced by culture.…”