Culture, contraceptive attitudes and advertising perceptions: the case of rural Zimbabwe
Date
2021
Authors
Jaravaza, Divaries Cosmas
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Abstract
This study examined information processing and behavioural responses to reproductive health advertising in subsistence marketplaces, providing an opportunity to advance marketing science through deepening our understanding of rural consumers‘ patterns of advertising responses (cognitive and affective) and how they relate to values, social axioms, contraceptive attitudes and socio-demographic factors. Birth control and safe sexual practices are important concerns, but, are least understood in the institutional context of subsistence marketplaces (Burgess & Steenkamp, 2006). Study 1 was on relations between culture and contraceptive attitudes and study 2 was on latent classes of advertisements responses to advertisement stimuli designed for subsistence markets. Study 1 and 2 had 395 and 225 respondents respectively. Measurement scales for study 1 were: the Portrait Values Questionnaire, the Social Axioms Scale, and the Contraceptive Attitude Scale. Study 2 used the same scales which were used in study 1 plus Mitchell and Olson‘s (2000) Attitudes Towards the Ad Scale items to evaluate four poster advertisements designed through qualitative research in rural Zimbabwe. Structural equation modeling was done using the rigorous two step approach of Anderson and Gerbing (1988), of which study 1 established that resultant self-conservation and religiosity had positive relations to contraceptive attitudes, whilst, fate control had negative relations to contraceptive attitudes. In study 2, the best fitting model, using latent class analysis, identified three segments of subsistence women‘s cognitive and affective perceptions of poster ads. Rural women‘s public health poster ads responses have not been previously studied. The four poster ads and the cues designed specifically for the unique context of subsistence markets rural consumers are a contribution to advertising research and practice. Also this study is the first to combine contraceptive attitudes, culture and advertising perceptions. Important lessons on ads design, measurement properties of scales and constructs relations are outlined
Description
A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, University of the Witwatersrand, in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of the Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Management, 2021
Keywords
Culture, Social Axioms, Personal Values, Contraceptive Attitudes, Advertising perception, Latent classes, Poster ads, Subsistence Marketplaces