The Impact of Medium Context on Bilingual Consumers' Responses to Code-Switched Advertising

While previous research has examined code-switched ads viewed in isolation (Luna and Peracchio 2005a, 2005b), this study makes a unique contribution by investigating the crucial role that medium context plays in responses to Spanish/English code-switched ads among bilingual consumers. A model is developed based on neuroscience and sociolinguistic theories of information processing. Among 122 bilingual Mexican Americans, path analysis showed that when a code-switched ad primarily written in Spanish (English) was placed within an all-Spanish (all-English) medium, increased ad recall and perceptions of advertiser cultural sensitivity occurred. In turn, increased perceptions of advertiser cultural sensitivity led to greater cognitive ad involvement and persuasion. Based on these findings, the main language of a code-switched ad should match that of its medium to increase favorable advertising responses.