Cognition, Emotion, And Brain Mechanism:Experimental Study Of The Effect Of Anime Image Endorsement

Great changes have taken place in our society when the virtual world and the real world thrive together in this digital era. Brand and anime image, as virtual things, play important role in symbolic economy and people’s spiritual world. In the previous studies, there have many divergences in cognition, emotion and brain mechanism in terms of assumptions, questions, conclusions and methods. However, this study investigates the effect of anime endorsement from the different aspects which refers to attention, credibility and the meaning of cross-cultural communication. More importantly, it aims to raise more attention on how cultural symbol affects people’s spiritual and physical world in the new social environment. It is important that this study can theoretically improve and build the model of anime image endorsement, including its cognition, emotion and behavior. Particularly, it would be highly useful in selection and evaluation of anime image endorsement."Framing Effect" which has been found by psychologist Daniel Kahneman, shows that human behavior and decision-making are not completely in a rational state. In the past, questionnaires, interviews and other research methods can’t really reflect the automatic process of decision-making and unconsciousness. It is an effective way to reflect the automatic processing of decision-making process by adopting some reasonable experimental research paradigm, such as emotional stroop effect, prime to detect, implicit association, etc... It can make up these weaknesses in previous researches.In this study, experimental paradigm will be used on the basis of the combination of behavior analysis, ERP (Event Related Potential) and EEG (Electroencephalograph) analysis. According to the statistics from six experimental groups which have been researched, it shows the differences of the effect of anime image endorsement in terms of its attraction, credibility and effects on cross-cultural meaning expression. This study has systematically made researches in the emotional response, attention mechanism and favorability of amine fans and non-fans towards anime images and celebrities. It also analyzes people’s bidding behavior for anime spokesman and celebrity endorsement. In addition, the effects of Chinese anime images endorsement of Chinese little-known brands, famous brands as well as foreign ones have been discussed in this study. At last, it has examined people’s explicit and implicit attitude about the combination among Chinese brands, foreign brands and animation.In this study, it has important theoretical significance to promote and build brand endorsement anime image effects as a model that includes cognitive, emotional and brain mechanisms. And Anime image endorsement has practical value for future selection and evaluation, which will let people think about how cultural symbols affect human spiritual world and the physical world under the new historical conditions.This study is divided into four main sections. The first part is Chapter1which talks about the origin of the study, the study’s reviews, issues and purposes, research methods, ideas and basic content. The second part is from Chapter2to Chapter7, with six experimental groups, aims to investigate the attractiveness of avatars brand endorsement, credibility and effectiveness on cross-cultural communications.The third part is Chapter8and Chapter9which has a comprehensive discussion, draw conclusions and attain the directions for further research by the results of six experiments. The fourth part is the appendix and references. In appendix part, it includes statistical results of all experiments, experimental guidance language, questionnaires about certain anime image from its birthplace with two scales.The main findings are as the follows:(1) There is no significant difference between anime fans and non-anime fans in terms of their attentions to images and celebrities; it takes much more time to process the information of anime images for people than that in celebrities. The automatic identification process of implicit memory of anime clue and celebrity clue are quite different.(2) Compare with celebrities, anime fans has much higher sentiment index when they see anime images. It is difficult to evoke positive emotion of anime fans when seeing celebrities. Non-anime fans have higher sentiment index about celebrity endorsements. But this positive sentiment is not transferred to brand perception.(3) In terms of a same brand, participants offer higher price for the products endorsing by anime images, which means the ratio of the bidding price and original price is higher. In terms of different brands, anime image and celebrity clues have no significant effects on bidding price. Also, there is no significant difference of the differentials between the bidding price and the original price. Thus, endorsement has limited influence on bidding.(4) For unknown brands, the acceptance ratio of combination of anime images and brands from the same country is significantly higher than those from different countries. Women accept Chinese animation image much easier.(5) For famous brands, the acceptance ratio of combination of anime images and brands from the same country is significantly higher than those from different countries. Anime images and brands from the same country get higher recognition. Women have lower acceptance than men in terms of foreign brands.(6) Participants show better explicit attitude for American and Japanese brands than Chinese ones. Women have more positive evaluations to American brands than men. There are significant differences about the extent of being familiar with Chinese, American and Japan animation. Women are more familiar with Japanese animation than men. It is easier to recognize anime images and brands from the same country. Significantly, the familiarity of Japanese animation is positively related to implicit attitude of the combination of Japanese-Chinese virtual anime images and brands. There is a significantly positive correlation between the familiarity of Japanese animation and implicit attitude of the combination of Japanese-Chinese anime images and brands.