Attitude transfer and brand extension evaluation: Exploring the influence of self-construal and parent brand's culture specificity

Using self-construal (Independent self vs. Interdependent self) as the individual level variable standing for culture, this research investigates the effects of culture and parent brands' culture specific associations on brand extension evaluation at the individual level. Experiment 1 finds that brand extensions extended by brands with high culture specific associations lead to more favorable attitudes for individuals with the target self-construal relative to a nontarget self-construal, while brand extensions extended by brands with low culture specific associations lead to more attitudinal similarities across self-construals. We further explores the extent to which differences in perceived diagnosticity as compared with differences in the accessibility of parent brands' associations better account for the attitudinal differences. Experiment 2 explores the two alternative (accessibility vs. diagnosticity) explanations for these effects of parent brands' attitude transfer process. The evidence is more supportive of the differential accessibility explanation. That is, high culture specific associations of the parent brands may be valued for individuals with the nontarget self-construal but are relatively inaccessible in their memory. The results of the two experiments help to reconcile conflicting findings in the brand extension literature, shed insight on why and how cultural differences might influence brand extension evaluation at the individual level.