The Price of Laughter: Differences Between Hispanic Groups' Responses to the Use of Humor in Financial Services Advertising

Abstract

This study argues for a more precise study of U.S. Hispanics by investigating the different attitudes toward money retention of two Hispanic groups, Cuban Americans and Mexican Americans, and its impact on advertising processing. The hypothesized dissimilarity, Cuban American have a more positive attitude toward retention than Mexican Americans, was used as the basis for hypotheses that explored the effects of the use of humor in advertising for a financial product. The results of a 2 × 2 experiment in which type of appeal (humorous/non‐humorous) was manipulated and Hispanic group affiliation was measured suggest that Cuban Americans prefer a nonhumorous appeal in an advertisement for a financial service whereas Mexican Americans preferred the humorous message. This finding suggests that Mexican Americans might use affective information, instead of cognitive strategies, to form attitudes toward financial products.

Humor and ad liking: Evidence that sensation seeking moderates the effects of incongruity‐resolution humor

“…Some individual difference moderators of the effects of humor in advertising have also been identified. These include: "need for humor" (Cline, Altsech, & Kellaris, 2003;; need for cognition (Geuens & Pelsmacker, 2002;Zhang, 1996aZhang, , 1996b; sex role (Conway & Dube, 2002); cultural background (Villegas & Shah, 2008); cultural orientation (Lee & Lim, 2008); sex of the consumer (Fugate, Gotlieb, & Bolton, 2000); and self-monitoring (Lammers, 1991).…”