It’s only words: idiom processing, language knowledge and consumer memory of Chinese print advertisements

Abstract

This study investigated the effects of employing Chinese idioms in headlines on consumer memory. The results indicated that, as hypothesized, the use of idiomatic headlines in print advertisements produced superior aided recall of headlines and recognition of brand names than employing non-idiomatic headlines. High language knowledge individuals also had greater aided headline recall and brand name recognition. However, this knowledge advantage was only observed for advertisements with idiomatic headlines. Aided headline recall generally mediated brand name recognition. Finally, the language knowledge results were robust across different knowledge measures.