Successful commercial played at the Super Bowl, the peak global sporting event for advertisers, have strong emotion in common, according a study.
But the emotions have to be in the right combination, say the researchers who looked at 296 commercials aired during Super Bowls between 2018 and 2022.
Results show that happiness and sadness together enhances ad liking but the presence of happiness and fear reduces it.,
And happiness and anger or happiness and disgust do not affect ad liking.
The researchers used emotion recognition technology to identify emotions based on the facial expressions of actors in Super Bowl commercials.
"The blend of emotions you witness in commercials during the big game isn’t a coincidence. It’s part of advertisers’ calculated strategy," write Boise State University's Niusha Jones, assistant professor of marketing, and Anne Hamby, associate Professor of marketing.
"Combinations of emotions are meticulously orchestrated to capture viewers’ attention and get them shopping – sometimes even before the ad has finished airing."
Happiness was the most common emotion portrayed, but the researchers were surprised to learn that 80% of these ads featured at least one negative emotion as well as happiness.
A clip reel of U.S. Olympian skier Lindsey Vonn evoked both sadness and happiness and deeply resonated with viewers.
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