Does commercial advertising influence xenophobia?: A personal values-mediated model

Résumé 0

Recent years have seen a rise in support for radical-right parties and politicians in many parts of the world, including Europe. These parties often hold to a nativist ideology, whereby it is believed that states should be inhabited exclusively by members of the native group and that foreign influences are generally harmful. At the individual psychological level, this nativism can be understood in terms of xenophobia. Past research has shown how advertising can prime personal values, and that these personal values are often associated with political attitudes and outgroup biases such as xenophobia. This dissertation considers whether advertising that primes particular personal values may have a short-term influence on xenophobic behaviour, and lays out a theoretical framework for considering how such short-term influences, if repeated, could have a long-term effect. Three studies were conducted as part of the dissertation. Firstly, a content analysis assessing the prevalence of different values in contemporary advertising in both Germany and the UK. The analysis found that openness-to-change values are more prevalent than conservation values (which are associated with xenophobia) in both countries. Secondly, secondary data analysis using Europe-wide data to determine the independent effect of self-focused values (including openness-to-change values) on attitudes towards migration. The results are mixed – with self-direction – one of two openness-to-change values – playing a direct independent role in predicting attitudes towards migrants in Post-Communist Europe, but not in Western Europe. Nevertheless, the strong negative effect of conservation values on attitudes towards migrants, together with the oppositional relationship between self-direction and conservation values implies that self-direction values can have an indirect effect on those attitudes in both country groups. Thirdly, a novel experimental approach is developed to assess whether commercial adverts prime values and in turn attitudes towards an outgroup (specifically the Turkish minority in Germany) in a simulated online letting agency scenario. The results of the study are inconclusive. Whilst the experimental manipulation in the final study had the hypothesised effect amongst male participants, it did not have any significant effect on female participants. Possible explanations for this divergence are explored. Combined, this series of studies suggests that commercial advertising, with its preference for openness-to-change values as opposed to conservation values, may be serving to repeatedly prime certain values that are associated with reduced xenophobia. This priming may indeed play a role in reducing xenophobia, although the evidence from the third study is not conclusive enough. Furthermore, a countervailing effect from appeals to self-enhancement values may also be in effect. As well as its empirical contribution, this dissertation makes numerous conceptual contributions. For example, a new definition of xenophobia is suggested, which allows one to include not only prejudice towards non-immigrant outgroups such as gypsies and Jews, but also distrust of foreign influences such as the European Union. A proposal is mode for how Schwartz’s values may be integrated into Duckitt’s Dual Process Model of political psychology. A framework is also proposed for using Schwartz’s values in the analysis of value appeals in ads, with a view to enabling a research programme on the cultivation of values through advertising. Lastly, a comprehensive outline for how self-focussed values can influence political attitudes is provided.