Masculine and Feminine Gender Cues in Destination Promotion Videos: The Effect of Voice Pitch

Voices are an important part of marketing communications. Hence, this study draws on sound symbolism to explore how voice pitch in a destination promotion video helps communicate the gender identity of a destination and ultimately generate visitors. The findings of three experimental studies demonstrate that a lower (vs. higher)-voice pitch symbolizes masculinity (vs. femininity), providing an obvious gender cue for tourists to evaluate the gender identity of a destination. This voiceover-destination congruency in masculinity/femininity perception was found to trigger one’s auditory mental imagery and travel intention, whereas voiceover-tourist congruency only fostered one’s travel intention to masculine destinations. Theoretically, results challenge self-congruency theory and suggest that masculine/feminine tourists may not necessarily value gender identity congruency as much as they have in the past which might be due to heterosexuality becoming less normative. Practically, auditory communication of destinations should consider masculinity/femininity congruency between the voiceover and the destination.