Culture and Visual Design Expectations

In the context of culture and visual design, the situation becomes a matter of credibility. That is, materials that audiences consider credible will be noted as worthy of attention and consideration. Materials considered non-credible will be ignored. What constitutes a credible or an acceptable visual presentation, however, is not fixed. Rather, the criteria one uses to evaluate the credibility and the appropriateness of a display can vary from culture to culture (Horton, 1993 & 1994; Kostelnick, 1995; Hager, 2000).

Past research in culture and image design reveals numerous situations where differing cultural expectations resulted in miscommunication . The physical appearance of an object, for example, can differ from country to country. As William Horton (1993, 1994) notes, the same item can have a very different features depending on the country in which the reader is located. Moreover, the cultural expectations of what features an item-or a visual representation of an item-should possess affect the credibility and the acceptability of visual displays. In the United States, for example, many electrical plugs have two flat, rectangular prongs while most European plugs have two cylindrical prongs (Horton, 1993). If the image of a plug does not display the correct shape of prongs, then individuals from another culture might consider that image non-credible. In this case, the situation would be, 'that plug looks nothing like any plug I've ever seen, so it can't be legitimate /the real thing.' Thus, the image is considered a non-credible one, and any related information might be ignored.

Problems related to cultural expectations of design features have been noted at many levels. As Web sites are visual media, a single unacceptable image could deter individuals from using a particular site. As William Horton (1993, 1994) and David Gillette (1999) note, the features one associates with a credible image of a mailbox can vary from one culture to another. These differences can affect the perception of icons used to indicate 'access my email account.' For example, the perception of a mailbox being a metal box that has a 'red flag' and that sits atop of a post is, essentially , an American one. In other cultures, a mailbox might be a small door in a wall or even a cylindrical metal container. As a result, international users might come to a Web portal (e.g., Yahoo or Excite) and expect to find a 'mail' function (an important and often expected feature of such portals). The features used to depict a mailbox in the portal's 'access mail' icon might, however, render that depiction unrecognizable to users from different cultures. Those users might then consider the associated Web portal non-credible, for they perceive it as lacking an essential design feature expected of credible Web portals. In this way, the use of a particular kind of image can affect cultural perceptions of entire sites.

Additionally, a single design feature can be enough to affect the credibility of an image or of an overall visual display. Cultures, for example, can associate varying meanings with the same color. These associations could affect how individuals from different cultures perceive the meaning of a particular marketing image. As Nancy L. Hoft (1995) notes, a blue ribbon usually indicates a winner (first place) in the United States, while the same color ribbon often indicates second place in the United Kingdom (in the UK, first place is generally indicated by a red ribbon). The different associations related to the color blue could affect how Americans vs. Brits perceive online marketing materials that tout a 'blue ribbon product' (first rate vs. second rate).

These differences in design expectations can affect how consumers form other cultures perceive marketing messages. As Edward T. Hall and Margeret Hall (1989) note, the Americans, the French, and the Germans have three very different sets of expectations related to the design of marketing visuals. Many Americans, for example, prefer images that 'are based on hyperbolae or ˜hype'' (p. 168). Many French consumers, conversely, seem to prefer marketing images that are 'based on product name recognition French ads are designed to be visually attractive and eye catching to get the attention of the buyers and are reinforced by repetition' (Hall & Hall, 1989, p. 127). Many Germans, however, tend to prefer 'ads that are loaded with detailed information and products are described and analyzed [in great detail]' (Hall & Hall, 1989, p. 71). The Halls also note that failure to meet the particular expectations of one of these cultures can result in a loss of credibility for the related product: 'Exaggerated [marketing] claims that a product is the best, newest, most fashionable, or finest are effective in the U.S. but would be both offensive and illegal in Germany and would win no awards in France' (p. 169).

Gurudutt R. Kamath (2000) notes a similar kind of distinction in cultural expectations of marketing visuals. According to Kamath, many Indian consumers have a particular perspective on comparative advertising-one that many western marketers might not expect. In many cases, advertising images that compare two products are 'still taboo' in India (Kamath, 2000, p. 11). Moreover, for many Indian consumers, images that attempt to 'disparage a rival or even mention a competitor's prices' are often looked upon with disdain (Kamath, 2000, p. 11). As a comparison/disparagement is often a part of western (particularly U.S.) marketing visuals, displays that depict such comparisons might inadvertently offend the sensibilities of Indian consumers. This difference has important implications for e-marketing strategies. When dealing with price comparisons, for example, one not only needs to consider the design of a particular marketing Web site, but also consider how linked (and often overlooked) pop-up ads displaying comparative pricing could violate Indian expectations of credible displays. [For online examples of such cultural visual differences, one might wish to go to the global sites for the Sony Corporation (www.sony.net) or for Mercedes-Benz (www.mercedes-benz.com) and compare how these companies use different visual designs to market products to various cultural groups.]

The key to avoiding such problematic differences lies in understanding cultural expectations of visual materials-including layout and the use and the design of individual images. To gain such an understanding, marketers and designers need a methodology they can use to identify cultural expectations. The resulting information can serve as a foundation for designing credible visuals for a particular cultural audience. Such a mechanism must therefore allow individuals to identify and to analyze credible examples in order to develop guidelines for effective visual design. By merging ideas from speech communication's rhetorical theory and psychology's prototype theory, one can create such a methodology. The remaining sections of this chapter provide an overview of concepts from both rhetorical theory and prototype theory and explain how these concepts can be merged into an effective system for identifying and analyzing visual displays.