New research in functional MRI (fMRI) and biometrics is showing that successful Super Bowl ads took viewers on an "emotional journey."
Time Warner Medialab, Innerscope Research, and Temple University's Center for Neural Decision Making conducted the study to better understand how consumers react to different types of advertising.
The research teams used a combination of biometric and fMRI technology to monitor viewers' skin conductance, heart rates, respiration, motion, and brain activation as they viewed different ads. Ads that included an emotional journey -- from companies such as Cheerios, Chevrolet, Budweiser, and Hyundai -- delivered the highest moments of engagement, they found.
Ads that performed well on biometrics elicited increased brain activity, which included brain regions associated with emotional relevance (amygdala), memory formation (hippocampus), and executive function (lateral prefrontal cortex), the researchers said.
