Abstract:

According to the Language Association Mechanism, people will produce some associations (i.e., advertising language image, ALI) when they contact advertising language. By employing the method of the grounded theory, five dimensions were put forward to describe the ALI. Exploratory factor analysis was conducted with 534 questionnaires and confirmatory factor analysis was conducted with 1279 questionnaires. Finally, six dimensions were drawn on, which include the capability image of language origin, the affinity image of language origin, the image of language user, the cultural affinity image of language, the characteristic image of language, and the sound image of language. The inventory of ALI consisted of nineteen items. The inventory is of significant reliability and validity. Especially, the predictive validity of the dimensions was testified by an experiment. It was found that ALI has positive influence on product evaluation and purchase intention. The research findings can provide the support in measurement for advertising language in the future. With the help of ALI, enterprises can consider appropriate languages to enhance the advertising performance and improve the marketing proficiency when they engage in multinational marketing activities.

Key words: Advertising language, Image, Dimension, Purchase Intention, Product Evaluation