Abstract:
Television advertising plays a key role in the marketing warfare in communicating
marketer’s distinctive strategy. Message source is one critical constituent that
determines the success of television advertising. The message source should be
selected with due concern to communicate the intended advertising message. The
message source is based on different source attributes such as credibility and
attractiveness within which aspects of knowledgeability, trustworthiness, similarity,
likeability and favourability are embedded. Despite the available literature reviews falls
short to indicate what source attributes are reflected by children, there is a mounting
tendency of appearing children directly or indirectly as the message source in television
advertising. Thus, the study is carried out to identify the message source attributes
reflected by children when appeared as a message source in television advertising in Sri
Lanka as perceived by the television audience. The sample was limited to television
audience in Colombo district with a sample size of 240. Fifteen closed ended questions
were administered by a survey based on two aspects of credibility and three aspects of
attractiveness. Major statistical tools used to analyse gathered data were the mean
values and the percentage analysis. According to the empirical results, respondents
have rejected the aspects of knowledgeability and trustworthiness on credibility and
similarity on attractiveness reflected by children as a message source. They have
accepted the likeability and familiarity on attractiveness as the message source
attributes reflected by children. In conclusion, likeability on attractiveness is the most
perceived message source attribute reflected by children in television adverting.
