I stumbled onto this Diary at the Daily Kos (and it’s really just someone’s opinion, take it for what it’s worth). The writer focuses on Hispanics and their view of comparison ads, or negative ads in the political sense:
You see, it’s a little-known fact outside the advertising and research industry that Hispanics and Latinos hate negative advertising. They hate it with a passion. In fact, Latinos consider some ads to be “negative” and unappealing that most other cultures and ethnicities in America would never label as such.
With over ten years as a focus group moderator and report writer in Southern California, I’ve watched literally hundreds of hours of focus groups with Latinos. Unfortunately, confidentiality prevents me from sharing details of the literally hundreds of research reports I’ve written dealing with Latino focus groups, so I’m asking you to trust me: rejection of negative or even merely competitive advertising by Latinos is a nearly universal phenomenon. If an ad concept compares two products and explicitly states that product “A” is superior to product “B”, that concept is almost always rejected as too negative. If an ad mocks the products or customers of another company, that ad is almost always rejected to being in bad taste. And downright nasty advertising? Don’t even try it. Culturally, Latinos want to see positive images and messages of cooperation and connection to family and friends; overt competition is frowned upon.
Is that true? Does anyone have any experience with Hispanic advertising that would corroborate this? It’s a fascinating discovery to me.
They have no problem, however, if the competition involves soccer—or fútbol.