The Influence of Gender on the Effectiveness of Probability Markers in Advertising natural processing environment. Such stimuli enable us to examine, in addition to claim persuasiveness, two more dependent variablesbrand attitude and purchase intention.The research consists of two studies in which advertisements using different types of probability markers (hedge, pledge, no probability marker) are tested with a sample of men and women. In the first study probability markers, brand familiarity, and involvement are manipulated in ads for physical products. Study 2 aims to extend the results of the first study by focusing on services, and adding the buying motivation (hedonic vs. utilitarian) dimension.Both studies were conducted in Belgium with different samples of young participants.
Gender Differences in Response to Probability Markers in AdvertisingThe Selectivity Model. According to the Selectivity Model (Meyers-Levy & Sternthal 1991), women tend to process information and form judgments comprehensively, taking into account all the available cues, assigning equal importance to information relevant to themselves and to others, and exhibiting great sensitivity to detail and all relevant information. Women encode a greater number of claims than men do and process each of the claims more extensively (Darley & Smith 1995). In other words, women could be considered as more systematic (central) processors. Men most often do not use comprehensive processing of all available information when forming judgments. They instead tend to make use of heuristic (peripheral) processing, relying on a highly available, salient single cue or subset of cues.Item-Specific vs. Relational Processing theory. Some cognitive psychologists (e.g., Hunt & Einstein 1981) distinguish between relational and item-specific processing, rather than heuristic (peripheral) and systematic (central). Relational processing occurs in situations in which people receive a number of similar cues, and relies on emphasizing similarities among these cues. Since women are considered to be relationship-driven, cooperative and communal,
