Paul Bolls - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Paul Bolls

Research paper thumbnail of Identifying Structural Features of Audio

Journal of Media Psychology: Theories, Methods, and Applications, 2008

This study tested the ability of nine different auditory structural features to elicit orienting ... more This study tested the ability of nine different auditory structural features to elicit orienting responses from radio listeners. It further tested the effect of the orienting response on listeners’ memory for information presented immediately following the orienting-eliciting structural feature. Results show that listeners do have significant decelerating cardiac patterns suggestive of orienting for eight of the nine features. Taken as

Research paper thumbnail of MODEL ETHNICITY AND PRODUCT CLASS INVOLVEMENT: WHITE AMERICANS' ATTITUDE TOWARD ADVERTISEMENTS FEATURING ASIAN-INDIAN MODELS

... Presented by Mulamootil Ronnie Matthew A candidate for the degree of Master of Arts, ... ____... more ... Presented by Mulamootil Ronnie Matthew A candidate for the degree of Master of Arts, ... _____ Professor Maria Len-Rios _____ Professor Bruce Bartholow Page 3. ...

Research paper thumbnail of I Saw It on the Radio: The Allocation of Attention to High-Imagery Radio Advertisements

Media Psychology, 2003

This study was conducted to explore how the level of imagery in a radio advertisement affects the... more This study was conducted to explore how the level of imagery in a radio advertisement affects the allocation of cognitive resources to encoding the message into memory. A within-subjects experiment was conducted in which participants listened to 24, 60-second radio advertisements that had been coded as either high-or low-imagery messages. Secondary-task reaction time was obtained during exposure to half of the advertisements, within each level of imagery. Self-reported involvement with the message was also obtained after exposure to each advertisement. Secondary-task reaction time was faster during exposure to the high-imagery advertisements. Self-reported involvement was greater for high-imagery advertisements, compared to low-imagery advertisements. Results of this study indicate that people allocate more controlled cognitive resources to encoding high-imagery radio advertisements than may be required by the message. Do radio listeners "see" it on the radio? The Radio Advertising Bureau (RAB) seems to think so. Campaigns, sponsored by the RAB to encourage radio advertising by businesses, highlight the strength of radio to engage the imagination and get listeners to "see" a product in use during exposure to a radio MEDIA PSYCHOLOGY, 5,

Research paper thumbnail of The effects of arousal on liking and believability of commercials

Journal of Marketing Communications, 1998

This study examines how arousal and the pace of television commercials affect viewers' attit... more This study examines how arousal and the pace of television commercials affect viewers' attitudes toward the ad claims (Aad-c), the non-claim elements (Aad-nc), the advertised brands (Ab), and purchase intentions (PI). Fast paced ads produced higher Aad-nc, Ab, and PI scores than slow paced ads. Arousing ads produced higher Ab and PI, but lower Aad-c. Results also found significant interactions between arousal and pacing on three of the four dependent variables. First, both pacing and content arousal improved Ab, and the two together were more effective than either by itself. The interactions seen for Aad-c and PI are somewhat more difficult to interpret. When ads were calm, the addition of fast pace decreased Aad-c and PI. However, when ads were arousing, the addition of fast pace increased Aad-c and PI. Some practical implications of the results and future research direction are offered.

Research paper thumbnail of The Effects of Dual-Task Processing on Consumers' Responses to High- and Low-Imagery Radio Advertisements

Journal of Advertising, 2007

ABSTRACT This study was designed to investigate the effects of dual-task processing on consumers&... more ABSTRACT This study was designed to investigate the effects of dual-task processing on consumers' responses to high-versus low-imagery radio advertisements. In a repeated-measures experimental design, participants listened to six high- and six low-imagery radio spots while simultaneously performing a visual-processing task (viewing a series of pictures unrelated to the ads or viewing a blank/black screen). Consistent with theoretical expectations, the high-imagery radio advertisements performed better than the low-imagery ads on measures of advertising involvement, attitude toward the ad, brand attitude, and purchase intention. The study found that high-imagery radio ads are universally superior, but suffer more when there is competition for cognitive resources. When a visual-processing task (viewing pictures) was introduced, consumers' responses became generally less favorable. The pattern of responses, however, varied across ad types and processing conditions. In particular, the detrimental effect of introducing a picture-viewing task was more pronounced for high-imagery ads than for low-imagery ads, as well as on measures of ad-related response (advertising involvement and attitude toward the ad). No such moderating effect was observed for brand-related responses (brand attitude and purchase intention). Theoretical and practical implications of these results are discussed.

Research paper thumbnail of Effects of Emotional Tone and Visual Complexity on Processing Health Information in Prescription Drug Advertising

Health Communication, 2012

This experiment explored how the emotional tone and visual complexity of direct-to-consumer (DTC)... more This experiment explored how the emotional tone and visual complexity of direct-to-consumer (DTC) drug advertisements affect the encoding and storage of specific risk and benefit statements about each of the drugs in question. Results are interpreted under the limited capacity model of motivated mediated message processing framework. Findings suggest that DTC drug ads should be pleasantly toned and high in visual complexity in order to maximize encoding and storage of risk and benefit information.

Research paper thumbnail of How Avatar Customizability Affects Children's Arousal and Subjective Presence During Junk Food–Sponsored Online Video Games

CyberPsychology & Behavior, 2009

The purpose of this study was to determine how children cognitively and emotionally process inter... more The purpose of this study was to determine how children cognitively and emotionally process interactive marketing of snack food products in advergames. Children (N ¼ 30) aged 10 to 12 were asked to play advergames with (a) avatars that were assigned to them, (b) avatars chosen from a pool, and (c) self-designed avatars. The children's skin conductance levels were collected during play. After gameplay, at each customization level, selfreported presence was collected. The results of this study indicate that customization of game avatars can affect both subjective feelings of presence and psychophysiological indicators of emotion during gameplay, which may make the gameplay experience more enjoyable. This may have implications for game sponsors and producers. Self-reported presence had no effect on psychophysiological indicators of emotion during gameplay. Implications of this finding and limitations of this study are discussed.

Research paper thumbnail of Choosing and Reading Online News: How Available Choice Affects Cognitive Processing

Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 2008

A within-subjects experiment explored how the number of online, hyperlinked stories available for... more A within-subjects experiment explored how the number of online, hyperlinked stories available for individuals to choose from affects cognitive processing of a selected story. Participants chose and read unpleasant online news stories from a Web page containing either 5 or 15 headline/photo hyperlinks. Heart rate data indicated more cognitive resources were allocated to reading stories selected from the larger array of hyperlinks. This increased allocation of cognitive resources also led to more accurate story recognition. Results of this study provide insight into information processing of interactive, online news as well as limited suggestions for the design of news Web sites.

Research paper thumbnail of Tourist mental-imagery processing: Attention and arousal

Annals of Tourism Research, 2014

ABSTRACT This study aimed to delineate how individuals process two types of advertising communica... more ABSTRACT This study aimed to delineate how individuals process two types of advertising communications (i.e., video versus high-imagery audio advertisements) in terms of mental imagery processing. Participant’s heart rate for attention and skin conductance for arousal were measured during exposure to both types of ads. Self-report responses were also obtained after exposure to each ad. There was no difference between the two types of ads in the resulting heart rates, while arousal measured using skin conductance was higher while watching videos ads than arousal while hearing high-imagery audio ads. This study also found self-report responses were greater or more favorable after video ads than after high-imagery audio ads.

Research paper thumbnail of Cognitive access to negatively arousing news

Communication Research, 2000

... There were no significant effects for education on the informativeness scale ... no differenc... more ... There were no significant effects for education on the informativeness scale ... no difference between the high-and low-education groups in the amount of attention paid to the ... there are dif-ferences in how people with higher and lower education encode information from the news. ...

Research paper thumbnail of When a Fear Appeal Isn't Just a Fear Appeal: The Effects of Graphic Anti-tobacco Messages

Journal of Broadcasting & …, 2010

... Glenn Leshner (Ph.D., Stanford University) is a professor in Strategic Communication and Co-d... more ... Glenn Leshner (Ph.D., Stanford University) is a professor in Strategic Communication and Co-director of the PRIME Lab in the ... disgust interact in threat appraisal and defensive avoidance, in phobias and anxiety disorders (Sawchuk, Meunier, Lohr, & Westendorf, 2002; Woody & ...

Research paper thumbnail of Identifying structural features of audio: Orienting responses during radio messages and their impact on recognition

This study tested the ability of nine different auditory structural features to elicit orienting ... more This study tested the ability of nine different auditory structural features to elicit orienting responses from radio listeners. It further tested the effect of the orienting response on listeners’ memory for information presented immediately following the orienting-eliciting structural feature. Results show that listeners do have significant decelerating cardiac patterns suggestive of orienting for eight of the nine features. Taken as

Research paper thumbnail of When Words Collide Online: How Writing Style and Video Intensity Affect Cognitive Processing of Online News

Journal of Broadcasting & …, 2009

This experiment explored how the writing style of online news, defined as inverted pyramid versus... more This experiment explored how the writing style of online news, defined as inverted pyramid versus narrative, affects the cognitive processing of accom-panying video clips. Forty seven participants read 4 online news stories and viewed the accompanying video clips. Results suggested ...

Research paper thumbnail of Something for Nothing: Is Visual Encoding Automatic?

Research paper thumbnail of The effects of production pacing and arousing content on the information processing of television messages

Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 1999

The limited capacity model of television viewing is used to investigate the impact of arousing co... more The limited capacity model of television viewing is used to investigate the impact of arousing content and fast paced production of viewers' information processing of TV messages. Results show that both fast pace and arousing content elicit self-reported arousal, but they elicit different patterns of physiological arousal. Both fast pace and arousing content increase the allocation of processing resources to messages. The combination of fast pace and arousing content overloads the processing system resulting in less recognition and cued recall for the specific content of the message. Results generally support the limited capacity theory of television viewing.

Research paper thumbnail of The Effects of Message Valence and Listener Arousal on Attention, Memory, and Facial Muscular Responses to Radio Advertisements

Communication Research, 2001

This study tested the validity of using facial electromyography (EMG) as a physiological measure ... more This study tested the validity of using facial electromyography (EMG) as a physiological measure of the valence of radio listeners' emotional responses to advertisements and explored the effects of message valence and listener arousal on attention and memory. A within-subjects experiment was conducted in which participants listened to ten 60-second radio advertisements that had been coded in a pretest as having either a positive or negative emotional tone. Facial EMG, heart rate, and skin conductance data were collected during exposure to the advertisements. Following exposure, participants completed free recall and recognition memory tests. Results demonstrated the validity of using facial EMG to assess the valence of emotional response to media messages. Heart rate data suggest that negative messages receive more attention than positive ones. Furthermore, how arousing a message is appears to be a better predictor of memory than message valence.

Research paper thumbnail of Identifying Structural Features of Audio

Journal of Media Psychology: Theories, Methods, and Applications, 2008

This study tested the ability of nine different auditory structural features to elicit orienting ... more This study tested the ability of nine different auditory structural features to elicit orienting responses from radio listeners. It further tested the effect of the orienting response on listeners’ memory for information presented immediately following the orienting-eliciting structural feature. Results show that listeners do have significant decelerating cardiac patterns suggestive of orienting for eight of the nine features. Taken as

Research paper thumbnail of MODEL ETHNICITY AND PRODUCT CLASS INVOLVEMENT: WHITE AMERICANS' ATTITUDE TOWARD ADVERTISEMENTS FEATURING ASIAN-INDIAN MODELS

... Presented by Mulamootil Ronnie Matthew A candidate for the degree of Master of Arts, ... ____... more ... Presented by Mulamootil Ronnie Matthew A candidate for the degree of Master of Arts, ... _____ Professor Maria Len-Rios _____ Professor Bruce Bartholow Page 3. ...

Research paper thumbnail of I Saw It on the Radio: The Allocation of Attention to High-Imagery Radio Advertisements

Media Psychology, 2003

This study was conducted to explore how the level of imagery in a radio advertisement affects the... more This study was conducted to explore how the level of imagery in a radio advertisement affects the allocation of cognitive resources to encoding the message into memory. A within-subjects experiment was conducted in which participants listened to 24, 60-second radio advertisements that had been coded as either high-or low-imagery messages. Secondary-task reaction time was obtained during exposure to half of the advertisements, within each level of imagery. Self-reported involvement with the message was also obtained after exposure to each advertisement. Secondary-task reaction time was faster during exposure to the high-imagery advertisements. Self-reported involvement was greater for high-imagery advertisements, compared to low-imagery advertisements. Results of this study indicate that people allocate more controlled cognitive resources to encoding high-imagery radio advertisements than may be required by the message. Do radio listeners "see" it on the radio? The Radio Advertising Bureau (RAB) seems to think so. Campaigns, sponsored by the RAB to encourage radio advertising by businesses, highlight the strength of radio to engage the imagination and get listeners to "see" a product in use during exposure to a radio MEDIA PSYCHOLOGY, 5,

Research paper thumbnail of The effects of arousal on liking and believability of commercials

Journal of Marketing Communications, 1998

This study examines how arousal and the pace of television commercials affect viewers' attit... more This study examines how arousal and the pace of television commercials affect viewers' attitudes toward the ad claims (Aad-c), the non-claim elements (Aad-nc), the advertised brands (Ab), and purchase intentions (PI). Fast paced ads produced higher Aad-nc, Ab, and PI scores than slow paced ads. Arousing ads produced higher Ab and PI, but lower Aad-c. Results also found significant interactions between arousal and pacing on three of the four dependent variables. First, both pacing and content arousal improved Ab, and the two together were more effective than either by itself. The interactions seen for Aad-c and PI are somewhat more difficult to interpret. When ads were calm, the addition of fast pace decreased Aad-c and PI. However, when ads were arousing, the addition of fast pace increased Aad-c and PI. Some practical implications of the results and future research direction are offered.

Research paper thumbnail of The Effects of Dual-Task Processing on Consumers' Responses to High- and Low-Imagery Radio Advertisements

Journal of Advertising, 2007

ABSTRACT This study was designed to investigate the effects of dual-task processing on consumers&... more ABSTRACT This study was designed to investigate the effects of dual-task processing on consumers' responses to high-versus low-imagery radio advertisements. In a repeated-measures experimental design, participants listened to six high- and six low-imagery radio spots while simultaneously performing a visual-processing task (viewing a series of pictures unrelated to the ads or viewing a blank/black screen). Consistent with theoretical expectations, the high-imagery radio advertisements performed better than the low-imagery ads on measures of advertising involvement, attitude toward the ad, brand attitude, and purchase intention. The study found that high-imagery radio ads are universally superior, but suffer more when there is competition for cognitive resources. When a visual-processing task (viewing pictures) was introduced, consumers' responses became generally less favorable. The pattern of responses, however, varied across ad types and processing conditions. In particular, the detrimental effect of introducing a picture-viewing task was more pronounced for high-imagery ads than for low-imagery ads, as well as on measures of ad-related response (advertising involvement and attitude toward the ad). No such moderating effect was observed for brand-related responses (brand attitude and purchase intention). Theoretical and practical implications of these results are discussed.

Research paper thumbnail of Effects of Emotional Tone and Visual Complexity on Processing Health Information in Prescription Drug Advertising

Health Communication, 2012

This experiment explored how the emotional tone and visual complexity of direct-to-consumer (DTC)... more This experiment explored how the emotional tone and visual complexity of direct-to-consumer (DTC) drug advertisements affect the encoding and storage of specific risk and benefit statements about each of the drugs in question. Results are interpreted under the limited capacity model of motivated mediated message processing framework. Findings suggest that DTC drug ads should be pleasantly toned and high in visual complexity in order to maximize encoding and storage of risk and benefit information.

Research paper thumbnail of How Avatar Customizability Affects Children's Arousal and Subjective Presence During Junk Food–Sponsored Online Video Games

CyberPsychology & Behavior, 2009

The purpose of this study was to determine how children cognitively and emotionally process inter... more The purpose of this study was to determine how children cognitively and emotionally process interactive marketing of snack food products in advergames. Children (N ¼ 30) aged 10 to 12 were asked to play advergames with (a) avatars that were assigned to them, (b) avatars chosen from a pool, and (c) self-designed avatars. The children's skin conductance levels were collected during play. After gameplay, at each customization level, selfreported presence was collected. The results of this study indicate that customization of game avatars can affect both subjective feelings of presence and psychophysiological indicators of emotion during gameplay, which may make the gameplay experience more enjoyable. This may have implications for game sponsors and producers. Self-reported presence had no effect on psychophysiological indicators of emotion during gameplay. Implications of this finding and limitations of this study are discussed.

Research paper thumbnail of Choosing and Reading Online News: How Available Choice Affects Cognitive Processing

Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 2008

A within-subjects experiment explored how the number of online, hyperlinked stories available for... more A within-subjects experiment explored how the number of online, hyperlinked stories available for individuals to choose from affects cognitive processing of a selected story. Participants chose and read unpleasant online news stories from a Web page containing either 5 or 15 headline/photo hyperlinks. Heart rate data indicated more cognitive resources were allocated to reading stories selected from the larger array of hyperlinks. This increased allocation of cognitive resources also led to more accurate story recognition. Results of this study provide insight into information processing of interactive, online news as well as limited suggestions for the design of news Web sites.

Research paper thumbnail of Tourist mental-imagery processing: Attention and arousal

Annals of Tourism Research, 2014

ABSTRACT This study aimed to delineate how individuals process two types of advertising communica... more ABSTRACT This study aimed to delineate how individuals process two types of advertising communications (i.e., video versus high-imagery audio advertisements) in terms of mental imagery processing. Participant’s heart rate for attention and skin conductance for arousal were measured during exposure to both types of ads. Self-report responses were also obtained after exposure to each ad. There was no difference between the two types of ads in the resulting heart rates, while arousal measured using skin conductance was higher while watching videos ads than arousal while hearing high-imagery audio ads. This study also found self-report responses were greater or more favorable after video ads than after high-imagery audio ads.

Research paper thumbnail of Cognitive access to negatively arousing news

Communication Research, 2000

... There were no significant effects for education on the informativeness scale ... no differenc... more ... There were no significant effects for education on the informativeness scale ... no difference between the high-and low-education groups in the amount of attention paid to the ... there are dif-ferences in how people with higher and lower education encode information from the news. ...

Research paper thumbnail of When a Fear Appeal Isn't Just a Fear Appeal: The Effects of Graphic Anti-tobacco Messages

Journal of Broadcasting & …, 2010

... Glenn Leshner (Ph.D., Stanford University) is a professor in Strategic Communication and Co-d... more ... Glenn Leshner (Ph.D., Stanford University) is a professor in Strategic Communication and Co-director of the PRIME Lab in the ... disgust interact in threat appraisal and defensive avoidance, in phobias and anxiety disorders (Sawchuk, Meunier, Lohr, & Westendorf, 2002; Woody & ...

Research paper thumbnail of Identifying structural features of audio: Orienting responses during radio messages and their impact on recognition

This study tested the ability of nine different auditory structural features to elicit orienting ... more This study tested the ability of nine different auditory structural features to elicit orienting responses from radio listeners. It further tested the effect of the orienting response on listeners’ memory for information presented immediately following the orienting-eliciting structural feature. Results show that listeners do have significant decelerating cardiac patterns suggestive of orienting for eight of the nine features. Taken as

Research paper thumbnail of When Words Collide Online: How Writing Style and Video Intensity Affect Cognitive Processing of Online News

Journal of Broadcasting & …, 2009

This experiment explored how the writing style of online news, defined as inverted pyramid versus... more This experiment explored how the writing style of online news, defined as inverted pyramid versus narrative, affects the cognitive processing of accom-panying video clips. Forty seven participants read 4 online news stories and viewed the accompanying video clips. Results suggested ...

Research paper thumbnail of Something for Nothing: Is Visual Encoding Automatic?

Research paper thumbnail of The effects of production pacing and arousing content on the information processing of television messages

Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 1999

The limited capacity model of television viewing is used to investigate the impact of arousing co... more The limited capacity model of television viewing is used to investigate the impact of arousing content and fast paced production of viewers' information processing of TV messages. Results show that both fast pace and arousing content elicit self-reported arousal, but they elicit different patterns of physiological arousal. Both fast pace and arousing content increase the allocation of processing resources to messages. The combination of fast pace and arousing content overloads the processing system resulting in less recognition and cued recall for the specific content of the message. Results generally support the limited capacity theory of television viewing.

Research paper thumbnail of The Effects of Message Valence and Listener Arousal on Attention, Memory, and Facial Muscular Responses to Radio Advertisements

Communication Research, 2001

This study tested the validity of using facial electromyography (EMG) as a physiological measure ... more This study tested the validity of using facial electromyography (EMG) as a physiological measure of the valence of radio listeners' emotional responses to advertisements and explored the effects of message valence and listener arousal on attention and memory. A within-subjects experiment was conducted in which participants listened to ten 60-second radio advertisements that had been coded in a pretest as having either a positive or negative emotional tone. Facial EMG, heart rate, and skin conductance data were collected during exposure to the advertisements. Following exposure, participants completed free recall and recognition memory tests. Results demonstrated the validity of using facial EMG to assess the valence of emotional response to media messages. Heart rate data suggest that negative messages receive more attention than positive ones. Furthermore, how arousing a message is appears to be a better predictor of memory than message valence.