EXPLORING THE MORPHOLOGICAL AND SYNTACTIC FEATURES OF POPULAR JAPANESE ADVERTISING SLOGANS

Abstract

This study delves into the morphological and syntactic properties of Japanese advertising slogans, seeking to uncover the relationship between their complexity and popularity. Using mathematical linguistics, we measure the morphological richness, syntactic diversity, and information amount of slogans across twelve genres. Our analysis employs Mean dependency distance (MDD) and entropy (ENTR) to examine syntactic complexity, while moving-average morphological richness (MAMR), moving-average mean size of paradigm (MAMSP), and mean word length (MWL) measure lexical diversity. The study reveals that exclamatory slogans have the highest information amount, while imperative slogans are the simplest in terms of syntax. Further, the research indicates that simpler slogans tend to be more popular among the Japanese in recent years, as evidenced by winning slogans from 2018 to 2021. Finally, we identify a statistically significant correlation between morphological richness and MDD with popular slogans. The paper concludes by highlighting the findings’ relevance to copywriters, helping them create effective advertising slogans.