Temporal instability as a moderating factor on advertising effectiveness

Hypotheses that diurnal variation in advertising exposure will influence consumers' immediate and delayed memory of emotional and rational television commercials were tested. The experiment employed a forced-exposure approach using 287 subjects recruited randomly from mall shoppers. Subjects were exposed to different formats of television commercials at three different times of the day. The experiment also varied levels of ad repetition. Analysis of recall and recognition revealed time-of-day X memory task interactions, such that both recall and recognition were greater following early-in-the-day exposures for immediate tests, especially for emotional ads. Scores for delayed tests were greater for the recognition measures following late-in-the-day exposures, particularly for rational appeals. The arousal theory in long-term memory is offered to explain the results. Implications for advertising research and testing are discussed.