Abstract:

Not many researchers started as copywriters. And few of these can be as lucid about research as is the following paper. An historical and practical review of advertising theories sets the scene. It reminds us that methods which worked in one environment may not succeed in another. Hence perhaps the need for successive and even contradictory theories: when one style gets so copied that it becomes ordinary, another takes its place. As in all the arts, ‘Astonish me,’ is a sound criterion. The Fishbein model has not had the wide application which, on this showing, it deserves. Perhaps the difficulties of measurement, of putting numbers on the qualities which are its constituent parts, are too great. But in the hands of a sensitive and practical believer the ideas are convincing. In the seminar opened by this paper, Translating advanced advertising theories into research reality, a number of important comments were made. The whole seminar should be read in order to understand why the way advertising works is more complex than Mary Tuck claims. Joyce (1971) is particularly worth reading for a wider viewpoint, as well as Bruce (1971) and Cowling (1971) for supporting this type of model about how people behave. Fishbein (1971) himself said that he was surprised that his theory had received the attention of practical businessmen. He also pointed out the real differences in the way even professionals use such terms as belief, attitude, intention and importance. He supports - as some do not - the principle that models should be employed only as long as they are useful.