Neuroimaging Techniques in Advertising Research: Main Applications, Development, and Brain Regions and Processes

Abstract

Despite the advancement in neuroimaging tools, studies about using neuroimaging tools to study the impact of advertising on brain regions and processes are scant and remain unclear in academic literature. In this article, we have followed a literature review methodology and a bibliometric analysis to select empirical and review papers that employed neuroimaging tools in advertising campaigns and to understand the global research trends in the neuromarketing domain. We extracted and analyzed sixty-three articles from the Web of Science database to answer our study questions. We found four common neuroimaging techniques employed in advertising research. We also found that the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex play a vital role in decision-making processes. The OFC is linked to positive valence, and the lateral OFC and left dorsal anterior insula related in negative valence. In addition, the thalamus and primary visual area associated with the bottom-up attention system, whereas the top-down attention system connected to the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, parietal cortex, and primary visual areas. For memory, the hippocampus is responsible for generating and processing memories. We hope that this study provides valuable insights about the main brain regions and processes of interest for advertising.

Neuromarketing: The popularity of the brain-imaging and physiological tools

“…These tools are studying, exploring, and analysing the neural responses of consumers toward marketing stimuli such as ads, products, brands, and prices. Meanwhile, ET is considered the popular physiological tool to record eye movements, attention, fixations, saccade, pupil dilation (Alsharif et al, 2021b;Alsharif et al, 2021d). In this study, the authors concentrate on the fMRI, EEG, and ET because these methods give a more accurate picture of the activity regions in mind timely, cost, temporal resolution, spatial resolution compared with the other methods.…”

“…For example, it has grabbed attention from huge business establishments to use these tools in their research to dive deep into the consumer's brain to know the underlying reasons for consumers' choices to satisfy their actual needs. Notably, by using neuroimaging and physiological tools, companies can only better understand the consumer's behaviour as the mechanisms of making-decision and what processes affect making-decision in the brain (Alsharif et al, 2021d). Lindstrom (2009) endorsed the benefits of the NM techniques for both consumers and firms when they discussed that products and advertising campaigns designed on neuromarketing techniques will benefit the consumer by guiding the consumer to make purchase decisions easier simple.…”

“…NM techniques are essential for marketing research (Alsharif et al, 2020a). According to Alsharif et al (2021d); Jordao et al (2017) the fMRI and EEG are the most brain imaging tools that applied to record the brain activity signal of the consumers toward marketing stimuli such ad advertising campaigns. Meanwhile, according to dos Santos et al ( 2015), the ET is the most common physiological tool.…”

“…MEG needs a specific environment such as low temperature (estimated zero), too expensive, and limited to recording the cortical regions, making it inappropriate for marketing research. The EEG technique can substitute the SST technique because EEG has more accuracy and reliability, which leads us to infer that EEG and fMRI are convenient tools (Alsharif et al, 2021d;Fortunato et al, 2014;Koc & Boz, 2018). fNIRS is a noninvasive tool, which uses the hemodynamic responses associated with neuronal activities (Krampe et al, 2018).…”

“…Meanwhile, it has acceptable temporal accuracy, estimated 1-6 seconds (s) to start recording the activity regions in the brain. Therefore, fMRI is deemed as one of the best techniques in marketing research to measure the neural responses of consumers such as emotion (e.g., valence, appeal, engagement, and arousal) toward brands (e.g., recall, recognition, preference, and liking) and advertising campaign (e.g., effectiveness) (Alsharif et al, 2021d;Casado-Aranda et al, 2018;Chen & Morris, 2016;Venkatraman et al, 2015). FMRI is used to know how different marketing stimuli impact buying decisions, including exposure to a certain advertisement (Morin, 2011;Smidts et al, 2014).…”