Attention, emotions and cause-related marketing effectiveness

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to explain how cognitive and emotional responses may influence decisions to purchase cause-related products. Design/methodology/approach – An experimental design clarifies how autonomic reactions determine altruistic choices in a simulated shopping environment. Eye-tracking and electrodermal response measurements were set to predict choices of hedonic vs utilitarian cause-related vs unrelated products. Findings – Emotional arousal, pleasure and attention to the cause-related bundle are associated with altruistic behaviour in hedonic choices. When facing utilitarian choices, customers focus on brand logo and donation amount while experiencing pleasure, but emotional arousal does not increase marketing effectiveness in this case. Research limitations/implications – The experiment may be replicated in the real-world shopping environment, but spurious influences will be difficult to control. Distracting cues such as background music and scents used to increase positive emotions may affect intensity of emotive and cognitive processes. Practical implications – The results highlight the prominence of automatic reactions in customers’ choices. In the present instance, managers’ effort should be directed to the raising of altruistic visual cues of the donation-based promotion and positive emotional responses through guilt reducing effects. Originality/value – The study pioneers the use of eye-tracking coupled with skin conductance measurement in experimental designs aimed at clarifying the role of autonomic reactions such as emotional arousal, pleasure and attention in the effectiveness of emotionally charged marketing campaigns.

Eye-tracking in Marketing Research

“…Other methods combined many times with eye-tracking include analysis of electrodermal activity (Guerreiro, Rita, Trigueiros, 2015) and heart rate variability (Christoforou, Christou-Champi, Constantinidou, Theodorou, 2015). Based on the number of searches in the EBSCO database of the phrases electrodermal activity or EDA or GSR or galvanic skin response and heart rate variability or hrv along with the phrase eye tracking or eye tracker or eye movement measurements fewer publications can be observed which may indicate less frequent using both methods simultaneously.…”

Measurement of Electrodermal Activity in Marketing Research

“…It turned out that a higher level of skin conductance or reduced time to reach the maximum level of arousal is associated with a greater likelihood of choosing a socially responsible product. Attention and emotional arousal are therefore autonomous reactions that affect the marketing effectiveness of this type of products (Guerreiro, Rita, Trigueiros, 2015).…”

“…This application of eye-tracking along with the measurement of electrodermal activity appeared, among others, in the study of Guerreiro, Rita and Trigueiros (2015) and Hurley, Hutcherson, Tonkin, Dailey and Rice (2015). The combined use of tracking eye movement and EDA can lead to a better perception of the role of pleasure, arousal and attention in predicting consumer behaviour (Guerreiro et al, 2015). The technique of tracking eye movements also allows assigning individual electrodermal reactions (including peak values) to specific objects on which the eyesight of the examined person is focused.…”

Untitled

“…Dentro de las ventajas del estudio de la emociones encontramos que al generar mensajes que coinciden con las emociones positivas, las empresas pueden establecer y mejorar su conexión con su público o consumidores meta (Codina, Rodríguez, & Cadena, 2017;Guerreiro, Rita, & Trigueiros, 2015;Khuong & Tram, 2015;Weiger et al, 2018) ya que los consumidores se animan más con las publicaciones de tipo social (Yu, 2014). Los beneficios económicos se basan también en un refuerzo de los vínculos sociales que así se producen y que Manchanda, Packard y Pattabhiramaiah (2015) llaman «dólares sociales» (social dollars).…”