Balconi Michela, Sansone Martina, Angioletti Laura
International Research Center for Cognitive Applied Neuroscience (IrcCAN), Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan, Italy.
Research Unit in Affective and Social Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan, Italy.
Front Psychol. 2022 Mar 7;13:834426. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.834426. eCollection 2022.
The COVID-19 pandemic has prompted the production of a vast amount of COVID-19-themed brand commercials, in an attempt to exploit the salience of the topic to reach more effectively the consumers. However, the literature has produced conflicting findings of the effectiveness of negative emotional contents in advertisings. The present study aims at exploring the effect of COVID-19-related contents on the hemodynamic brain correlates of the consumer approach or avoidance motivation. Twenty Italian participants were randomly assigned to two different groups that watched COVID-19-related or non-COVID-19-related commercials. The hemodynamic response [oxygenated (OHb) and deoxygenated hemoglobin modulations] within the left and right prefrontal cortices (PFC) was monitored with Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy (fNIRS) while brand commercials were presented, as the prefrontal lateralization was shown to be indicative of the attitude toward the brand and of the approach-avoidance motivation. First, the findings showed that the COVID-19-related contents were able to prompt emotional processing within the PFC to a higher extent compared to contents non-related to COVID-19. Moreover, the single-channel analysis revealed increased OHb activity of the left dorsolateral PFC compared to the left pars triangularis Broca's area in the group of participants that watched the COVID-19-related commercials, suggesting that the commercials may have driven participants to dedicate more attention toward the processing of the emotional components compared to the semantic meaning conveyed by the ad. To conclude, despite expressing unpleasant emotions, commercials referring to the highly emotional pandemic experience may benefit the advertising efficacy, increasing the capability to reach customers.
新冠疫情促使大量以新冠为主题的品牌广告诞生，试图利用该话题的显著性更有效地触达消费者。然而，文献中对于广告中负面情绪内容的有效性存在相互矛盾的研究结果。本研究旨在探究与新冠相关的内容对消费者趋近或回避动机的大脑血流动力学相关性的影响。20名意大利参与者被随机分为两组，分别观看与新冠相关或与新冠无关的广告。在播放品牌广告时，使用功能近红外光谱技术（fNIRS）监测左右前额叶皮质（PFC）内的血流动力学反应[氧合血红蛋白（OHb）和脱氧血红蛋白调制]，因为前额叶的偏侧化被证明可指示对品牌的态度以及趋近-回避动机。首先，研究结果表明，与新冠无关的内容相比，与新冠相关的内容能够在更大程度上促使PFC内进行情绪处理。此外，单通道分析显示，观看与新冠相关广告的参与者组中，左侧背外侧PFC的OHb活性相较于左侧布洛卡区三角部有所增加，这表明与广告所传达的语义意义相比，这些广告可能促使参与者将更多注意力投入到情绪成分的处理上。总之，尽管提及高度情绪化的疫情经历的广告表达了不愉快的情绪，但它们可能有利于提高广告效果，增强触达客户的能力。
