Neuroscientific techniques applied to audiovisual stimuli: cognitive-emotional analysis of Heineken commercials during COVID-19

Abstract

Using neuroscience techniques applied to the analysis of audiovisual content, four Heineken advertisements produced during the COVID-19 pandemic are studied. The main objective is to detect what cognitive and emotional responses the different stimuli elicit in thirty subjects and to evaluate whether the narrative construction of the advertisements works when conveying their advertising messages in images and sounds. For this purpose, after a preliminary textual analysis, tools for recording facial microexpressions and eye tracking are used, and the research is completed with a recall test. The results indicate the predominance of the emotions of joy and surprise, as well as the presence of other emotions (disgust, contempt, sadness) at specific moments. At the same time, it was found that the types of images that most captured the viewer's attention were those that included eye-catching, exciting, illustrative actions of the pandemic (mask, distance greeting, etc.) or that introduced written text on the screen. Likewise, it is observed that the Heineken product in its various materialisations (bottle, tap, logo, etc.) is only perceived prominently in the frame if there is a dramatic action that accompanies or underlines it. In contrast, the human figure (especially the eyes) is the visual component on which the subjects' gaze is predominantly focused. Finally, the results of the memory test coincide with the rest of the analyses with respect to the intensity of the emotions produced by the stimuli.