How to Capture the Heart? Reviewing 20 Years of Emotion Measurement in Advertising

Abstract

In the latest decades, emotions have become an important research topic in all behavioral sciences, and not the least in advertising. Yet, advertising literature on how to measure emotions is not straightforward. The major aim of this article is to give an update on the different methods used for measuring emotions in advertising and to discuss their validity and applicability. We further draw conclusions on the relation between emotions and traditional measures of advertising effectiveness. We finally formulate recommendations on the use of the different methods and make suggestions for future research.

Emotional Context and Effectiveness of Tv Advertising

“…This study has demonstrated relevance of the emotional context on TVC effectiveness measured by the four indicators which are traditionally used in marketing research: Ad recall, Aad, Ab and PI (Poels & Dewitte, 2006). To the best of our knowledge, this is the first experimental study in which Ad recognition has been assessed by the reaction time, in which TVC effectiveness has been assessed by use of a completely novel TVC, and in which the emotional context has been manipulated by standardized stimuli from the IAPS (Lang et al, 2008) and the IADS (Bradley & Lang, 1999) databases.…”

“…It has been reported that contents preceding advertising can induce positive or negative emotions, which primarily affect the attitude toward the ad (Coulter, 1998;De Pelsmacker et al, 2010). Furthermore, a positive or a negative attitude toward the ad can affect the attitude toward the brand and the purchase intent (Coulter, 1998;Mackenzie, Lutz, & Belch, 1986;Mehta, 2000;Poels & Dewitte, 2006). The emotional context of TVC can be the program in which TVC is presented, or other TVCs in the same commercial break.…”

“…Traditionally, advertising effectiveness is measured by several indicators: attitude toward the ad (Aad), attitude toward the brand (Ab), purchase intention (PI) and Ad recall (Poels & Dewitte, 2006). Today, global TV advertising budget approaches 200 billion dollars annually (Price Waterhouse Coopers, 2016), and companies spend 80-85% of their promotional budgets on media presence (Kelley, Jugenheimer, & Sheehan, 2015).…”

Mood measurement with Pick-A-Mood: review of current methods and design of a pictorial self-report scale

“…Moreover, reported responses can be biased because they rely on the respondents' ability and willingness to report their feelings. Furthermore, (especially long) item-based methods have been criticised not only for being generally burdensome and time-consuming (Curren et al, 1995), but also for requiring cognitive processing which may distort the original feelings (Poels & Dewitte, 2006). These limitations are particularly relevant when affect is assessed in naturalistic settings, such as before or after human-product or social interaction in the context of use.…”

Measuring Semantic and Emotional Responses to Bio-inspired Design

“…In addition, the use of emotional scales which often contains a long list of emotion adjectives might cause respondent fatigue. Moreover some of respondents have difficulties in to expressing their feeling because they are not always aware of them and/or certain pressure from social bias (Poels and Dewitte, 2006).…”