affective/emotional conditioning

Affective/Emotional Conditioning

• Advertisement (US) --> change in feeling state (UR)

• Watson & Raynor (1920)

• Taste aversion– Emotional state “automatic”– Lack of conscious control

Affect

• Little agreement in literature on terminology

• Bower & Forgas (2000)– Emotion: intense, short-lived, has identifiable

cause– Mood: subtle/diffuse, long-lasting, non-specific

causation– “Affect” encompasses both emotion and mood

Advertising

• To influence consumers’ brand opinions

• Use affect to change brand evaluation

• Performance content– Content to convince consumers that the brand is

best

• Performance void– Visual and/or audio to induce positive feelings

Classical Conditioning Framework

• CS = brand

• US = something that produces affective state (i.e., the UR)

• CR = induced affective state; influences operant decision to purchase

• Affective Classical Conditioning (ACC)

Example: Visuals as US

• Generate positive feelings– e.g., kitten

• For some brands, may also imply brand benefits or quality– e.g., for tissues, kitten may also indicate softness– e.g., for water filter, mountain stream may indicate purity

• See: Mitchel & Olson (1981)

Methodology Issue

• To control for visuals, use US that produces affect with no potential brand meaning

• But, CS and US need to have shared relevance/relatedness in advertising– Hard to generate artificial neutral stimuli

Ad Framing

• Presenting positive or negative consequences

• Aims to alter affect in consumer

• Positive ad framing– Make purchase and receive positive affect

• Negative ad framing– Don’t purchase and receive negative affect

Which is Better?

• Kahneman & Tversky (1979): Prospect Theory– Argue in favour of negative ad framing– People should react more strongly to potential

loss than to potential gains– Displeasure of losing perceived as more

consequential than pleasure of gaining

• However, majority of research generally shows positively framed messages to be more effective

Affect Priming

• Ad framing presents information producing affect-congruent associations

• Affect priming is subsequent activation of affect paired with brand

• Associationist’s principle of “similarity”– Similar affect-related associations more easily

linked

Effects of Affect

• Schwarz & Bless (1991)

• If individuals feel positive, they believe the environment is safe

• Safe subjects are less likely to engage in message elaboration

• More likely to rely on “peripheral cues” for judgments, less message elaboration.

• Martin, Ward, Achee & Wyer (1993)– Happy people engaged in a task

• Believe task is enjoyable, produces the affect itself, continue task longer

– Sad people engaged in the same task• Attribute negative affect to task and quit sooner

• Mathur & Chattopadhyay (1991)– Happy TV program contexts lead to more

attention to ad and message elaboration than sad program context

– Transfer to advertisements?

Affect Source?

• From advertisement?• From brand?• From context in which advertisement is

embedded?– For TV commercial, the TV program– For print advertisement, the magazine,

newspaper, etc.

• All could be producing ACC effects

Emotional Perspectives

• Affective conditioning hypothesis– “Subconscious”

• Mood judgment interpretation– Cognitively “active”

Emotional Arousal

• From advertisement?

• From brand?

• From context in which advertisement is embedded?– For TV commercial, the TV program– For print advertisement, the magazine,

newspaper, etc.

Effects of Arousal

• Yerkes-Dodson effect– Inverted U– Aids memory retention/recall to some point

Arousal/intensity

Mem

ory/

resp

onse

Excitation Transfer of Arousal Paradigm

• Study effect of arousal on behaviour

• Emotion produced by interaction of:– Physiological arousal

– Cognitive processing of situation

• Emotional effects can be delayed and can linger– Underlying physiology (neurotransmitters, hormones)

• Associate arousal with brand/product

Importance of Timing

• Park & McClung (1985)– Highly arousing TV program may interfere with commercial’s

effectiveness

• View arousing TV program, view commercial• No delay: arousal attributed to program• Short delay: mistakenly attribute arousal to commercial• Implication

– Be careful when/where you place embedded advertisements

In the “Pod”

• First few may not benefit from residual arousal

• Later commercials will

• Control over ad placement in pod?

Product Evaluation

• Hedonic criteria– Product enhances positive affect via self-

esteem, social validation, reputation, immediate gratification, etc.

• Utilitarian criteria– Product solves a problem

• Evaluation parallels “transformational products” and “informational products”

Product Type, Affect Effects

• Adaval (2001)

• Affect effects re: purchasing appear when product evaluation for hedonic criteria

• Less relevant for utilitarian criteria; product performance more significant

Chang (2008)

• Sneakers with fictitious brand name in artificial ad• Positively and negatively framed ad messages (re:

self-esteem, social recognition)• Folder with sneaker ad and other distracter ads

given to subjects• Questionnaire on affect and thoughts on ads and

products• Positively framed ads elicit higher levels of

positive affect than negatively framed ads

Gresham & Shimp (1985)

• Attitude to ads (AAd)

• Attitude to brands (AB)

• What mediates processes for AAd to influence consumer’s AB?

– Central issue for advertisement theory

• Four possibilities

Four Possibilities

• Classical conditioning– Brand paired with

affectively-valenced ad

• Cognitive Response– AAd influences AB

indirectly via impact on brand cognitions

– Effects of arousal

• Reciprocal Causation– AAd & AB are mutually

causative

– Positive/negative attitude held to both product and ad

– Causative strength varies with consumer and situation

• No relationship– AAd & AB influence choice

independently

Requirements for Classical Conditioning

• Affective reaction to ad changes buyers’ AB without altering their cognitive structure (CSB)

Hypothesis 1

• Positive/negative affective ads --> significant influence on AB

• But, could AB affect AAd?

Hypothesis 2

• Experimental group (positive/negative affective ad) will have more/less positive AB than control group

• But, also must show AB affected by AAd, not by changes in CSB

Hypothesis 3

• No significant difference in experimental and control subjects’ CSBs

Study

• Rated 15 TV commercials (supermarket products) on affective scale– Positive, neutral, negative

• 5 experimental groups– One ad from each group– Questionnaires for AAd, AB, and CSB

• 1 control group– Questionnaires for AB and CSB

Results

• Statistically speaking, inconclusive

• More generally, trends offer support for classical conditioning interpretation

Design Problems

• Used “mature” brands– e.g., Zest, Schlitz, Dr. Pepper– Consumers familiar with product

– Drives AB --> AAd

• Recommendation– Develop new TV ads for fictional products– Tricky and expensive