apmmc 2013 paper presentation
TRANSCRIPT
ATTITUDE TOWARDS ADVERTISING: A COMPARISON BETWEEN MARKETING AND
NON-MARKETING STUDENTS AT A PRIVATE UNIVERSITY
APMMC 2013
Ernest Cyril de RunHiram Ting
Jee Teck WengSally Lau Yii Choo
Introduction
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
• As technology continues to grow rapidly, seen especially in the burgeoning use of internet, young consumers are becoming increasingly aware of various advertisements, thus making the whole matter more intricate than ever before (Purosothuman, 2008; Tai, 2007).
• While much research has been conducted to investigate public’s attitude towards advertising, studies that seek to understand students’ attitude towards advertising are also on the rise (Dubinsky & Hensel, 1984; Larkin, 1977; Munusamy & Wong, 2007).
• University students represent a meaningful and substantial segment of the general public, and hence it requires continual attention (Beard, 2003).
Introduction (cont.)
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
• This study aims to investigate the present view of university students towards advertising. In particular attitude of marketing and non-marketing students from a private university towards advertising is focused on.
Brief Review of Literature
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
Attitude towards Advertising• Interest in assessing attitude towards advertising is generated and perpetuated
by empirical results that underline its effect on advertising effectiveness (Greyser & Reece, 1971; Kotler, 1988; Mehta, 2000; Mehta & Purvis, 1995), attitude towards specific advertisement (Lutz, 1985), purchasing behavior (Bush, et al., 1999; Ha, et al., 2011), and social policies (Pollay & Mittal, 1993; Rotzoll, et al., 1986; Wills & Ryans, 1982) .
• Such attitude is predicted by beliefs about advertising, which is described as specific statements about the attributes of objects (Brackett & Carr, 2001; Ducoffe, 1996; Pollay & Mittal, 1993; Wang, et al., 2009).
• The seven-factor belief model by Pollay and Mittal (1993) is regarded as one of the most comprehensive works in explaining attitude towards advertising (Korgaonkar, et al., 2001; Munusamy & Wong, 2007; Ramaprasad & Thurwanger, 1998).
Brief Review of Literature (cont.)
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
• The model includes two dimensions, namely personal utility factors and socioeconomic factors, and these measures have been validated empirically (Korgaonkar, et al., 2000; Korgaonkar, et al., 2001). Personal utility factors are made up of product information, social image information and hedonic amusement whereas socioeconomic factors are composed of good for economy, materialism, falsity and value corruption.
Theoretical Consideration • Theory of Reasoned Action by Fishbein and Azjen (1980) is adopted as the
basis to investigate students’ beliefs and attitude towards advertising.
Research Framework
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
Product Information
Attitude towards Advertising
Intention towards Advertising
Social Image/Role
Pleasure/Hedonism
Good for Economy
Materialism
Falsity/No Sense
Corrupting Value
Research Problems
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
• It is evident that recent development in economic and technology has changed the landscape of academia and business to a large extent in a short period of time (Eze & Lee, 2012). University students can see and learn so much in front of their computers, smartphones and paid TV (Waller & Fam, 2000). There is still a huge gap in the knowledge of measurement of students’ beliefs and attitude towards advertising when compared to the West (Munusamy & Wong, 2007; Ramaprasad, 1994).
• Furthermore there is an extreme lack of literature on how marketing and non-marketing students perceive advertising. Despite being one of the major components in marketing, it remains unclear as to what differentiate marketing students’ belief and attitude towards advertising from others.
Hypotheses
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
H1: Beliefs about advertising (seven belief factors) between marketing and non-marketing students will be significantly different.
H2: Attitude towards advertising between marketing and non-marketing students will be significantly different.
H3: Intention towards advertising between marketing and non-marketing students will be significantly different.
Methodology
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
• Private university can be quite different from public university (Lee, 2004a, 2004b; Wan, 2007), and this is apparent in the university’s clientele (Ahmad & Noran, 1999; Altbach, 2002; Sato, 2007; Wan, 2007).
• Students studying at Swinburne University of Technology Sarawak (SUTS) in the year of 2013 constitute the population of the study. The reason for such selection is because SUTS is one of the two largest private universities with its own campus in Sarawak.
• Purposive sampling approach was used to ensure proportionate marketing and non-marketing students were sampled. A self-administered questionnaire based survey was used to collect data.
• 300 copies were distributed and 217 usable copies were later collected.
Findings
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
Respondents profile:Variable Frequency Percent
Gender Male 100 46.1Female 117 53.9
Race Malay 12 5.5ChineseIndianOthers
1483
54
68.21.4
24.8University Year First year
Second yearThird yearFourth yearPostgraduate level
68885371
31.340.624.43.20.5
Type of Student MarketingNon-marketing
101116
46.553.5
Findings (cont.)
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
Mean and T-test Values by Marketing and Non-marketing Students
Variable Item Overall Marketing Non-Marketing CronbachAlphaMean STD Mean STD Mean STD
Intention 3 4.40 1.11 4.43 1.03 4.37 1.18 0.88Attitude 2 4.96 0.93 5.01 0.91 4.92 0.94 0.64Information 3 5.42 0.98 5.39 1.03 5.45 0.92 0.77Image Role 3 4.35 1.11 4.36 1.00 4.35 1.20 0.74Hedonism* 3 4.75 1.06 4.62 1.12 4.87 0.99 0.70Economy 3 4.47 0.79 4.34 0.80 4.58 0.78 0.25MaterialismR 3 3.48 1.20 3.46 1.18 3.50 1.23 0.68FalsityR 2 3.75 1.06 3.75 1.09 3.75 1.04 0.49CorruptedValueR 2 3.85 1.01 3.86 0.98 3.85 1.03 0.69
* t-test significant at 0.05; R indicates reverse-coded
Discussion
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
• The findings show that product information, hedonic amusement and good for economy are three most dominant beliefs shared by both marketing and non-marketing students at the private university. This corresponds to the early study done on marketing and non-marketing students in the public university (de Run & Ting, 2013).
• Only hedonic amusement of advertising is significantly different between marketing and non-marketing students. as advertising is a social phenomenon which people see everywhere and every day, it also explains why both groups of students share the same beliefs about advertising. Given such conclusion, it is clear that the first hypothesis is not supported.
Discussion (cont.)
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
• The findings also show that attitudes and intentions towards advertising between marketing and non-marketing students are not significantly different. This contradicts the findings of de Run & Ting (2013) at a public university in Sarawak. As such the second and third hypotheses are also not supported.
• It suggests that there is no distinctive characteristic about marketing and non-marketing students in terms of their view about advertising.
• It may due to the fact that private universities usually provide more lenient pathway to entry, and more flexible selection of courses. As a result, marketing students may end up graduating as management students because they can take management as major subject and marketing as minor subject. Moreover non-marketing students can also take marketing as their elective course.
Conclusion
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS)
• Despite receiving different types of education, marketing students seem to share similar beliefs, attitude and intention towards advertising with non-marketing students.
• From the academic point of view, this may be something to look into so as to redefine the value of marketing studies. Otherwise, marketing would simply become an optional subject for students to complete the required unit of studies.
• From the business perspective, it may well insinuate the reasons why marketing is being commonized in many organizations in Sarawak. Many are still treating marketing as almost a synonym to sales or a mere subset to business in general, thus deprecating it as a discipline and profession in its own right. Such mentality and condition may have prevented organizations in the state to grow and develop further.
THANK YOU
Ernest Cyril de Run
Faculty of Economics and BusinessUniversiti Malaysia Sarawak
94300 Kota Samarahan, Sarawak, Malaysia E-mail: [email protected]