Television Drama, Narrative Engagement and Audience Buying Behavior

Abstract

/ In the past few years, the popularity of Korean television dramas, songs and movies has skyrocketed in countries of North and Southeast Asia. This huge wave of Korean pop culture is referred to as the Hanryu (the Korean wave). One of the most significant trendsetters of the Hanryu was the Korean television drama Winter Sonata, which was remarkably popular in every Asian country where it was broadcast. The present article investigates the perception of Japanese audience members toward Winter Sonata's narrative and how this perception influenced their buying behavior of Winter Sonata memorabilia, such as clothing, cosmetics, DVDs/CDs of the program, trips to Korea and the like. Employing both qualitative and quantitative methods, this study finds that the popularity of the drama was generated by Japanese audiences' engagement with its narrative. Further, the audience perception of the narrative's quality was found to predict whether or not they purchased a Winter Sonata product.

HallyuRevisited: Challenges and Opportunities for the South Korean Tourism

“…To date, there have been relatively substantial efforts from both national and international tourism academics on the subject, but few of them have sought to synthesise and engage with the wider social science paradigm of culture, society, film, media and tourism research. Within the realm of media, communication and cultural studies, previous works have examined the impact of Hallyu on local audiences' reception of Korean TV dramas and the social and cultural meanings attached to their viewing experiences in importing countries such as China, Taiwan, Singapore and Japan (Hanaki et al, 2007;Huang, 2011;Kim, Singhal, et al, 2009;Joo, 2011;Leung, 2009;Ryoo, 2009;Shim, 2006 … academically this pan-East Asian transnational pop culture phenomenon has yet to be submitted to a more systematic comparative analysis, both in terms of its reception and consumption in different locations, and in terms of a comparison with similar genre entertainment from other parts of East Asia.…”

“…This social and cultural phenomenon immediately attracted significant interest from industry practitioners and academic researchers in a variety of ways, and has been studied by international scholars across multiple disciplines, including media and communication studies (e.g. Cho, 2005;Hanaki, Singhal, Han, Kim, & Chitnis, 2007;Kim, 2005;Kim, Singhal, et al, 2009;Oh, 2009;Ryoo, 2009;Shim, 2006;Yin & Liew, 2005) and cultural studies (e.g. Cho, 2011;Huang, 2011;Joo, 2011;Leung, 2009).…”