Advertising Theory: Reconceptualizing the Building Blocks

A large amount of research in advertising utilizes theories from other disciplines and simply uses an advertising message as a stimulus or focal content topic. The actual elements that make advertising unique are often ignored in this work. It is proposed here that advertising theory and research needs to become more focused on what makes advertising a distinct phenomenon and these elements need to be incorporated in our thoughts and research. Four examples of possible elements are suggested here. These are skepticism, repetition, message coordination and clutter. Research in each of these areas is reviewed and illustrations of how they may impact theory development and theory testing in advertising are presented.