The role of emotional images in the persuasive effect of television commercials

One of the strategies with which television commercials attempt to persuade is the emotional appeal. This appeal communicates emotion by verbally describing the plight of the characters or visually showing their tribulations, or through a combination of the two. This study examined viewer responses to emotional and non-emotional advertisements, and compared the effects of verbally presented emotional content and visually presented emotional content, all within the unique low-involvement experience that is television viewing. The author hypothesized that emotional appeals of all types would enhance arousal, memory, and attitudes over non-emotional appeals, and that visual depiction of emotional experience would evoke more intense physiological responses, greater recognition, and more favorable attitudes than emotional appeals communicated through verbal description or non-emotional appeals. Thirty-four undergraduates viewed eighteen advertisements embedded in a half-hour television program selected to reproduce a low-involvement viewing situation. Effects of the independent variable, advertisement type (three levels), were assessed in terms of subjects' responses to the advertisements on three dependent measures: electrodermal activity (EDA), delayed recognition, and attitude toward the advertisement (Aad). Responses to emotional commercials were significantly greater than responses to non-emotional commercials on the Aad and recognition measures, and nearly significantly greater on the EDA measure. Responses to emotional-visual advertisements were not significantly higher than responses to emotional-verbal advertisements, although the responses were in the hypothesized direction on two measures. Viewers' recognition ability for emotional advertisements, when the group's outlier was removed, was significantly better than for non-emotional advertisements. A weak main effect for gender was evident in the Aad and EDA measures, with females having significantly higher scores than males on both measures. The results provided tentative support for the primary hypotheses. Subjects responded differently to emotional and non-emotional advertisements. The results suggest that emotional appeals will be most effective at evoking physiological arousal, enhancing memory, and creating more positive attitudes--a condition other research has linked to enhanced intention to purchase the product. This study also demonstrates the importance of creating a low-involvement viewing environment in which to test television commercials.