The intensifying effects of exciting television programs on the reception of subsequent commercials

Abstract

This paper examines the effects of viewer excitement as elicited by television programs on the effectiveness of commercials embedded in such programs. A review of the literature suggests that the physiological arousal which results from suspenseful or emotional programs can be usefully characterized as an intensifier of important viewer responses. A brief overview of the literature on program context effects to date is given and a model is developed which positions arousal in relation to other mediating variables affecting commercial impact. The paper concludes with a summary of the more pressing issues arising from the study of excitement as an aspect of media environment.

Examining the Covert Nature of Product Placement: Implications for Public Policy

“…This does not mean however that behavior will be influenced. According to traditional cognitive response theory, message comprehension is necessary for a behavioral response to occur (Brock & Shavitt, 1983), but in a covert situation the consumer does not recognize the message (Petty & Cacioppo, 1983;Singh & Hitchon, 1989;Yalch & Elmore-Yalch, 1984).…”

Context Effects on Recall and Recognition of Magazine Advertisements

“…In the case of television advertising, a start has been made at investigating the effects of surrounding program material on the effectiveness of the embedded advertisements. Among the aspects of program context that have been found to influence advertisement effectiveness are the following: program genre (Schwerin 1958;Schwerin and Newell 1981), program-induced viewer mood (Axelrod 1963;Goldberg and Gorn 1987;Kamins, Marks and Skinner 1991), programadvertisement congruity (Bello, Pitts and Etzel 1983;Hansen, Barry, Reed and McGill 1976;Horn and McEwan 1977;Johnson 1981;Kamins, Marks and Skinner 1991;Lambert 1980;Murphy, Cunningham and Wilcox 1978), program-induced viewer excitement (Singh, Churchill and Hitchon 1987), and program-induced viewer involvement (Bryant and Comisky 1978;Clancy and Kweskin 1971;Kennedy 1971;Krugman 1983;Leach 1981;Menneer 1987;Siebert 1978;Soldow and Principe, 1981;Television Audience Assessment 1984;Thorson, Reeves and Schleuder 1985). The findings that have been reported to date tend to suggest that the most important context variable, as far as advertisement effectiveness is concerned, is programinduced viewer involvement.…”

Cross-advertisement affectivity: The influence of similarity between commercials and processing modes of consumers on advertising processing

“…Both consistency and congruency theory (Pavelchak et al, 1988;Singh and Hitchon, 1989) would predict that experiencing positive feelings due to a program enhances recall, positive affective reactions triggered by the ad, ad liking and subsequent attitudes. In support of this, Aylesworth and MacKenzie (1998) observed that television ad processing was better when people were in a positive mood after seeing a program.…”

“…With respect to programelicited feelings (Goldberg and Gorn, 1987;Pavelchak et al, 1988;Coulter, 1998), two important dimensions of the affective reactions induced by a program have to be examined: the intensity of the reactions induced (sometimes termed "arousal", Singh and Hitchon, 1989) and the valence/quality/polarity of the affective reactions (i.e., the pleasantness or pleasure dimension). In line with previous research, and in view of the dominance of positive emotions in advertising, we focus on positively valenced emotional advertising, and examine the influence on advertising processing of variations in affective intensity, from absent, in case of an affectively neutral commercial to intense, in case of an intensely positive emotional commercial.…”