【正文】 iang, 2020). Past research in the standardization issue has been diverse in theoretical perspectives, including contingency theory (Melewar and Vemmervik, 2020) global marketing strategy (GMS) theory (Okazaki et al., 2020。 Zou and Volz, 2020), global consumer culture theory (GCCT) (Akaka and Alden, 2020。 Okazaki et al., 2020), and resourceadvantage theory (Griffith and Yalcinkaya, 2020). Research methods employed by scholars were also diverse, such as survey (Fam and Grohs, 2020。 Okazaki and Mueller, 2020). Nevertheless, several key aspects of the standardization issue remain unsolved (Fam and 山東建筑大學畢業(yè)論文外文文獻及譯文 5 Grohs, 2020). A major limitation of the past research is that standardization in international advertising was conceptualized in a general sense。Wei and Jiang, 2020). However, Duncan and Ramaprasad (1995) did not elaborate on the different configurations of creative strategy and execution to make their approach empirically testable. Building on Duncan and Ramaprasad’s (1995) framework, Wei and Jiang (2020) developed a model with a typology of creative strategy and execution as two dimensions. In doing so, they were informed by the configurational theory of anizations (Meyer et al., 1993。 Ries and Trout, 1986), which is the key element of modern marketing management (Hooley et al., 1998。 the strategies range along a continuum anchored by being global and being local, from global consumer culture positioning (GCCP) and foreign consumer culture positioning (FCCP) to local consumer culture positioning (LCCP). Specifically, GCCP refers to a strategy that “associates the brand with a widely understood and recognized set of symbols believed to constitute emerging global consumer culture” (Alden et al., 1999, p. 75). It resonates with increasingly global segments of consumers (Okazaki et al., 2020). On the other hand, FCCP refers to a strategy that “positions the brand as symbolic of a specific foreign consumer culture。 Okazaki et al., 2020。 Zou and Volz, 2020). The RBV theorist argued, “differential endowment of strategic resources among firms is the ultimate cause of their strategy and performance” (Zou and Volz, 2020, p. 62). Building on these two theories, the GMS theory explicitly incorporates both external industry globalization conditions and internal anizational factors as the critical variables that motivate an MNC’s pursuit of a GMS. More importantly, the balance between the two set of variables, that is, the degree to which an MNC’s GMS matches its external environment and internal anizational resources, would make a difference in the MNC’s performance in the global market (Okazaki et al., 2020。 Florenthal and Shoham, 1999。 Samiee et al., 2020) have identified a number of internal and external factors that are conducive to standardization of international advertising. These include consumer and market similarities between the home country and the targetmarket country, level of market petition, products that are highinvolvement, autonomy of a MNC’s subsidiaries, and the convergence of consumer demand. We focussed on the influence of MNC’s external environment on 山東建筑大學畢業(yè)論文外文文獻及譯文 10 advertising standardization in the present study based on the theoretical consideration that it stood out as a critical factor that affects MNCs’ internal structures and forces them to adapt their structures and strategies to changing conditions outside the MNCs (Okazaki et al., 2020). Our focus is also based on empirical evidence reported in past studies conducted among the business anizations in the European Union (EU). For example, Taylor and Okazaki (2020) found that business anizations in the EU were more likely to adopt highly standardized advertising strategies than highly localized strategies because of the integration of the EU markets. Similarly, Okazaki et al. (2020) surveyed managers of subsidiaries of Japanese and US MNCs operating in the EU。 Mueller, 1987, 1992) have applied Pollay’s framework to the crosscultural context and derived a coding framework paring western with nonwestern cultural values that were manifested in advertising messages. Findings shed some light on the issue of standardization in international advertising. For example, Cheng and Schweitzer (1996) examined the cultural values reflected in 1,105 Chinese and US TV mercials and found that Pollay’s framework as equally applicable in the Chinese context. They suggested that Chinese advertising also merely reflected those cultural values that could help sell products and ignored those that could not benefit advertisers. Therefore, the studies have provided the sufficient ground for this study in how to measure cultural values in advertisements. However, other scholars (. Alden et al., 1999) argued that increasing globalization has led to the emergence of a GCC in which the global segments of consumers in countries around the world use a particular product or brand, or the brand may serve as “a conduit to feeling at one with global culture” (GCCT。 Okazaki et al., 2020). In other words, “consumers’ social interaction with brands increasingly transcends territorial boundaries and bee increasingly global” (Okazaki et al., 2020, p. 21). Distinctively different from the argument of homogenization of consumers as previously envisioned by some of the leading scholars such as Levitt (1983), GCC reflects “the global diffusion of consumption signs and behaviors, predominantly from Western and Asian developed countries。 however, from the GCC framework perspective, cultural values are expected to diffuse from the mature consumer countries to the others. Examining the concept of advertising appeals in relation to cultural values as well as the larger GCC, past crosscultural studies have proposed that cultural values manifested in advertising would transcend territo