Journal of Applied Psychology

1977, Vol. 62, No. 4, 493-498

Effects of Interactive Imagery on Learning:

Application to Advertising
Kathy A. Lutz and Richard J. Lutz
University of California, Los Angeles

The effect of type of picture accompanying word paired associates on recall

was investigated. Forty-eight brand and product pairs with their accompanying
pictures were drawn from the Yellow Pages of a local telephone directory.
Seventy-two subjects were placed into a four-group design consisting of two
control and two experimental groups. The two experimental groups were shown
either interactive or noninteractive pictures with each word pair. The two con-
trol groups were shown only the word pairs. The group receiving the interactive
imagery remembered more brand names than the noninteractive imagery group
(£<.01). Comparison of each experimental group with its control revealed
that only the interactive imagery group differed significantly from its control
(p < .01), suggesting that the interactive feature of a mediating image is a
necessary condition for a facilitative effect.

There has been a great deal of research and to Wittrock, 197S, for a review of right-
lately on the effects of imagery on learning, hemisphere brain processing and its implica-
indicating that concreteness as a stimulus tions for learning.) The present study in-
attribute is positively correlated with the vestigates the effects of external imagery on
learnability of material and that mental learning and also includes a simple self-report
imagery as a mnemonic device aids recall technique so that the functional stimulus of
(Bower, 1972; Paivio, 1969). An important mental imagery may be better understood.
distinction is that which is made between The effects of external imagery on learning
external imagery—pictures and other graphic have been investigated primarily within the
modes of stimulus presentation—and internal paired-associate learning paradigm. Experi-
or mental imagery, which external imagery mental participants shown an interactive
presumably elicits. Research in the area of image relating two items in a paired-associate
brain lateralization suggests that mental learning task have significantly higher recall
imagery may be operationally denned as scores than those not presented with an
right-hemisphere brain processing and can be interactive picture and given only rote repeti-
elicited by external imagery. The evidence tion instructions (Davidson, 1964; Kerst &
that external imagery elicits right-hemisphere Levin, 1973; Lippman & Shanahan, 1973;
processing has come from studies of brain Milgram, 1967; Reese, 196S). One necessary
electroencephalograms during the processing condition for a facilitative effect is the inter-
of different kinds of external stimuli such as active feature of the mediating image. An
pictures and printed text (Galloway & Harris, interactive image integrates the two items in
1974; Morgan, McDonald, & MacDonald, some mutual or reciprocal action. When pic-
1971). (The reader is referred to Palmer, torial interaction of the items is not achieved
197S, for a theoretical treatment of mental so that they are shown in a noninteractive
imagery and visual information processing and separate imaginal space (side by side),
the benefit of imagery as an associative aid
is greatly reduced or lost altogether (Bower,
Requests for reprints should be sent to Kathy A. 1970; Bernbach & Stalonas, 1973; Neisser &
Lutz, Behavioral Technology Laboratories, Depart-
ment of Psychology, University of Southern Cali- Kerr, 1973).
fornia, University Park, Los Angeles, California There is some evidence that the more pic-
90007. torial the interaction, the more facilitative
493
494 KATHY A. LUTZ AND RICHARD J. LUTZ

INTERACTIVE IMAGERY

Picture Interaction Letter Accentuation

Rocket Messenger Service Dixon Crane Co.

NON-INTERACTIVE IMAGERY

Name Product or Service

OBear Abrasive Saws

Figure 1. Examples of types of imagery mediating the brand-product pairs.

the mediating image. One study (Lippman &
Shanahan, 1973) denned several types of
interactive imagery and found that the most
facilitative image is that which achieves
maximum figural unity of the two elements.
In the Lippman and Shanahan study, con-
cerning vocabulary acquisition by children,
word pairs that were also shown as pictures
in interaction were better learned than word
pairs for which the interaction stimulus con-
sisted of a picture and a word rather than
two pictures.
Promoting a new or unfamiliar product
can be considered a type of paired-associate
learning task, in that the consumer is to learn
to associate a particular brand or company
name with a product or service. One appplica-
tion of imagery is advertising presentations
in print media such as newspapers and phone
directory Yellow Pages. The present study
investigated the memorableness of brand-
product pairs and their accompanying images
taken from the Yellow Pages of a telephone
directory for a major metropolitan area. Two
basic types of accompanying images were
identified: (a) an interactive image that inte-
grates at least parts of both the brand and
product together in one, integrative picture
and (b) a noninteractive image that depicts
the brand or product separately from the
written form of the other member of the pair.
This second type of imagery is by far the
most common, and the typical form includes
a picture of the product with the brand
written next to it. Based on evidence that
visual memory is better than verbal memory
(Erdelyi & Becker, 1974; Haber, 1970;
Paivio & Csapo, 1969; Shepard, 1967), the
 INTERACTIVE IMAGERY IN ADVERTISING
brand rather than the product should be pre-
sented in pictorial form so that memory for
the brand may be enhanced although not
necessarily associated with the corresponding
product or service. Both types of pictures—
those depicting the brand name and those
depicting the product or service—were in-
cluded in the noninteractive imagery treat-
ment so that any differential effects could be
investigated. Figure 1 shows examples of both
types of noninteractive imagery. Interactive
imagery also includes picture interaction and
letter accentuation. In the latter category,
some letter or letters in the brand name are
made to look like the product or one of its
characteristics. Picture interaction occurs
when both items of the pair are depicted
pictorially and are shown together in inter-
action. Findings discussed earlier suggest that
items accompanied by picture interaction
images should be better remembered than
those accompanied by letter accentuation
pictures. Examples of both types of inter-
active imagery are presented in Figure 1.
Method
Subjects
Seventy-two undergraduate college students in
four sections of an introductory marketing class
participated in the study during a regular class
meeting at the request of the instructor. Of the 40
juniors and 32 seniors, the majority were males,
with the seven females distributed among the lour
groups.
Materials and Design
Companies listed in the Yellow Pages of a metro-
politan telephone directory were used in this study.
The students' task was to learn to associate the
company's proper name or brand name with its
product or service. Forty-eight name-product pairs
were selected from the directory following these
criteria: (a) The pair was deemed likely to be
unfamiliar to college students, (b) no artifact
rendered the pair easily remembered, and (c) an
appropriate picture accompanied the ad. Previous
familiarity was subjectively determined by the
authors, who eliminated well-known brands.
To isolate the effect of imagery from that of
other factors such as associative meaningfulness,
pairs were excluded if the items of the pair were
phonetically similar, conceptually or semantical!)'
related, or if they possessed any other mnemonic
relationship. In other words, pairs were not used
495
in the study if the product itself served as a cue
or prompt for the brand name. Rhyming and al-
literation, for example, were not permitted because
phonetic similarity could affect recall for such pairs
as Bob's Bail Bonds and Mauer's Flower Shop.
Generic brand or company names, such as Stork
Diaper Service and Minuteman Timeclock Corpora-
tion, were excluded to avoid the confluence of
meaningfulness and imagery. Familiar local geo-
graphical locations such as street names and cities
were also not allowed. Finally, names that served
as type or class cues for the product were not used
in the study. Pairs such as Fu Ling Chinese
Restaurant and Nordic Danish Furniture were
excluded for this reason.
Pictures accompanying the pairs were examined
and classified into two main categories, interactive
imagery and noninteractive imagery. Because all
brand-product pairs and pictures were taken from a
phone directory, it was not possible to obtain
examples of both types of imagery for each item.
Therefore, a four-group design was used that in-
cluded two control groups. The noninteractive
imagery group saw 24 pairs, consisting of 12 with
brand pictures and 12 with pictures of the product;
its control group saw only the 24 printed items
with no pictures. The interactive imagery group
received a different set of 24 item pairs for which
interactive images were available, whereas its control
group received the same 24 pairs but without the
accompanying pictures.
Procedure
Four versions of the stimulus booklet were pre-
pared with instructions on the front page and each
of 24 brand-product pairs presented on separate
pages. Booklets for the two control groups con-
tained only printed stimuli on each page, whereas
booklets for the two imagery groups included both
printed and pictorial stimuli. Twenty copies of each
version were prepared, and booklets were randomly
distributed to each class. The students were in-
structed to look at the contents of each page care-
fully during the allotted time, since they would
need to remember the items for the second part of
the experiment. The order of the pages was ran-
domized so that all class members were not simul-
taneously viewing the same item. Viewing time for
each page was 10 seconds. Following the acquisition
phase, the booklets were collected and answer sheets
were distributed.
On the answer sheet, the student indicated his or
her grade level, sex, handedness, and type of mental
processing experienced while viewing the stimulus
materials. Type of processing was assessed by a
self-report nominal scale consisting of the following
question: "What best describes how you spent the
time looking at each page of the booklet [of stim-
uli! ?" Subjects responded to this question on a
forced-choice basis by checking one of three cate-
gories, which described visual, verbal, and task-
496 KATHY A. LUTZ AND RICHARD J. LUTZ

Table 1 ences were found on individual difference

Means and Standard Deviations For Brand variables, except that students in the control
Names Recalled groups reported experiencing a form of
mental processing during the acquisition
Condition M SD
phase different from that experienced by the
Group experimental groups.
Interactive imagery"
Experimental 8.82 4.25 Recall Tests
Control 5.39 2.89 Scores for all four groups on the recall tests
Noninteractive imagery1"
Experimental 4.95 3.41 are given in Table 1. The interactive imag-
Control 5.22 4.78 ery group performed better than its control,
^(1,33) = 7.90, p < ,01. This result is not
Subgroup too surprising, considering the evidence that
Picture interaction visual memory is superior to verbal memory.
Experimental 6.53 2.94 The comparison of the noninteractive imag-
Control 3.67 2.11
Letter accentuation ery group, however, with its control revealed
Experimental 2.29 1.93 no difference, / ? (1,3S) — .04, ns. Apparently,
Control 1.72 1.45 the nature of the mediating image is of
Brand imagery critical importance in producing the facilita-
Experimental 3.21 2.49
Control 2.78 2.49
tive effect of imagery. This suggests that
Product imagery imagery effects are not attributable solely to
Experimental 1.74 1.48 the superiority of visual memory.
Control 2.44 2.20 The interactive imagery group recalled
more brand names than the noninteractive
Note, n = 18 for each control group.
« « = 17. imagery group, F ( l , 34) = 9.21, p < .01.
b
n = 19. Omega squared for this analysis is .19, indi-
cating that about one fifth of the variance
unrelated processing, respectively. To measure brand in recall scores is attributable to the type
recall, the answer sheet contained a series of 24 of imagery treatment.
blanks followed by the product classes for all of the In the noninteractive imagery treatment,
brand-product pairs. Students were instructed to half of the images depicted the brand name
fill in the blanks with brand names of those pairs
that they could remember. This recall task seems and half were pictures of the product or
most representative of the natural environment in service. A comparison of each of these sub-
which a consumer must think of a brand or com- groups with its corresponding subgroup in
pany for a desired product. An item was scored as the control condition revealed no differences
correct if brand name was correctly recalled (no
more than a two-letter discrepancy from correct
between recall of those two types. However,
spelling) and matched with its corresponding product a correlated or within-subjects test revealed
or service. that students in the noninteractive imagery
group recalled more items accompanied by
Results name images than items for which product
images were presented, £(18) = 2.83, p < .OS.
Differences in recall of brand names were This finding suggests that it is more effective
found between the two experimental groups, to present the brand rather than the product
with the interactive imagery group remem- in pictorial form.
bering more brands than the noninteractive Two types of images were presented to the
imagery group. Comparison of each experi- interactive imagery group during acquisi-
mental group with its control revealed no tion—letter accentuation and picture inter-
difference between the noninteractive imag- action. Table 1 presents the means for the
ery group and its control, whereas the inter- subgroups. Comparison of the experimental
active imagery group recalled significantly and control group on recall of picture inter-
more brands than did its control. No differ- action items revealed a significant difference,
 INTERACTIVE IMAGERY IN ADVERTISING 497

with the experimental group recalling more Table 2

names of pairs accompanied by picture inter- Contingency Table of Reported Mental
action images, F(l, 33) = 11.04, p < .01. Processing and Treatment Groups
Surprisingly, however, the comparison of
letter accentuation items did not reveal a Mental processing
difference in recall between the experimental Group Verbal Visual
and control group. Of the 24 items, 14 were
presented using picture interaction and 10 Interactive imagery
using letter accentuation. The means for each No. 4.0 13.0
are presented in Table 1. The interactive % 5.6 18.1
imagery group recalled 47% of the items pre- Noninteractive imagery
sented with picture interaction and only 23% No. 3.0 16.0
of the letter accentuation items. A within- % 4.2 22.2
group test revealed a significant difference Combined control
between these proportions, £(16) = 4.84, p < No. 28.0 8.0
.01. Thus, superiority of the interactive imag- % 38.9 11.1
ery group seems to be due to the greater
recall of picture interaction items. indicates that students may not automatically
generate mental imagery for verbal stimuli, in
Individual Differences spite of the evidence that imagery is a potent
mnemonic aid. A comparison of the two
Comparison of each experimental group experimental groups on type of processing
with its control and also comparison of the reported no difference, x 2 U) — -03, ns, which
two experimental groups revealed no sta- suggests that mental imagery per se is not
tistical differences on the variables of grade necessarily facilitative.
level, sex, and handedness. The groups appear
to be equivalent on these dimensions, indi-
Discussion
cating that the randomization procedure was
successful. Research findings concerning imagery have
implications for the design of information
Mental Processing presentations. The use of pictures in ads
would seem justified by the evidence that
The two control groups were combined for visual memory is better than verbal memory.
the analysis of differences between treatments The present study indicated, however, that
on reported mental processing. The fre- merely presenting a picture in an ad will not
quency distribution of reported verbal or necessarily be an improvement over a purely
visual processing for the three groups—inter- verbal presentation. A distinction must be
active imagery, noninteractive imagery, and made between the types of external imagery
combined control—was analyzed using the and their differential effectiveness. An inter-
chi-square test. Table 2 indicates that the active image facilitates recall better than a
groups differed in their distribution of mental noninteractive image, presumably by in-
imagery report, with x s (2) = 24.73, p < .01. creasing the concreteness of the material to
Visual inspection indicates that both experi- be learned, that is, the association of the two
mental groups reported experiencing more items. The more concrete the association
mental imagery than did the control groups. becomes, the more memorable it is.
Collapsing the two imagery groups into one Previous studies on the effects of inter-
group in a 2 X 2 contingency table confirms active images suffer from a lack of ecological
the effect that experimental subjects gave representativeness (Snow, 1973) because the
greater frequency of mental imagery re- experimenters constructed the pairs to be
ports than did the control groups, with x 2 (0 learned as well as the mediating pictures
= 22.24, p<.0l. This result, as expected, rather than drawing them from naturally
498 KATHY A. LUTZ AND RICHARD J. LUTZ
occurring stimuli. Such use of contrived
stimuli limits the external validity of the
experimental results. Lippman and Shanahan
(1973), for example, made up word-paralog
(pseudoword) pairs and various types of
accompanying images. Not only were the pic-
tures contrived, but the paralogs were not
naturally occurring elements of any vocabu-
lary. The present study used real-world stim-
uli to increase the implications for advertising
effectiveness.
The use of interactive imagery is clearly
implied for effectively promoting the associa-
tion of a brand name with its product or
service. Picture interaction is the most desir-
able type of imagery to use, but it requires
that both items of the pair be portrayable
in pictorial form. Although products can usu-
ally be pictured quite easily, it may require
some ingenuity to pictorially depict a service,
and it may be impossible to create an image
equivalent of some brand names. Letter
accentuation images can be used for such
brands, but an item analysis revealed large
variation in recall of these items, suggesting
that other variables are also effecting recall.
The better remembered items had images that
seemed humorous or unusual. Future research
should identify the other variables that con-
tribute to the effectiveness of letter accen-
tuation images, since any advertiser can
potentially use this type of imagery.
References
Bernbach, H. A., & Stolonas, P. M. The effect of
isolated imagery on free recall. Bulletin of Psycho-
nomic Science, 1973, 1, 227-228.
Bower, G. H. Imagery as a relational organizer in
associative learning. Journal of Verbal Learning
and Verbal Behavior, 1970, 9, 529-533.
Bower, G. H. Mental imagery and associative learn-
ing. In L. Gregg (Ed.), Cognition in learning and
memory. New York: Wiley, 1972.
Galloway, E., & Harris, P. R. Coupling between
cortical potentials from different areas. Science,
1974, 183, 873-875.
Davidson, R. E. Mediation and ability in paired-
associate learning. Journal of Educational Psychol-
ogy, 1964, 55, 352-356.
Erdelyi, M. H., & Becker, J. Hyermnesia for pic-
tures: Incremental memory for pictures but not
words in multiple recall trials. Cognitive Psychol-
ogy, 1974, 6, 159-171.
Haber, R. N. How we remember what we see.
Scientific American, 1970, 222, 104-112.
Kerst, S., & Levin, J. R. A comparison of experi-
menter-provided and subject-generated strategies in
children's paired-associate learning. Journal of
Educational Psychology, 1973, 65, 300-303.
Lippman, M. Z., & Shanahan, M. W. Pictorial
facilitation of paired-associate learning: Implica-
tions for vocabulary training. Journal of Educa-
tional Psychology, 1973, 64, 216-222.
Milgram, N. A. Verbal context versus visual com-
pound in paired-associate learning by children.
Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 1967,
5, 597-603.
Morgan, A. H., McDonald, P. J., & Macdonald, H.
Differences in bilateral alpha activity as a function
of experimental task, with a note on lateral eye
movements and hypnotizability. Neuropsychologia,
1971, o, 459-469.
Neisser, V., & Kerr, N. Spatial and mnemonic
properties of visual images. Cognitive Psychology,
1973, 5, 138-150.
Paivio, A. Mental imagery and associative learning
and memory. Psychological Review, 1969, 76, 241-
263.
Paivio, A., & Csapo, K. Concrete-image and verbal
memory codes. Journal of Experimental Psychol-
ogy, 1969, 80, 279-285.
Palmer, S. E. Visual perception and world knowl-
edge: Notes on a model of sensory-cognitive
interaction. In D. A. Norman, E. E. Rumelhart,
and the LNR Research Group (Eds.), Explora-
tions in cognition, San Francisco: Freeman, 1975.
Reese, H. W. Imagery in paired-associate learning
in children. Journal of Experimental Child Psy-
chology, 1965, 2, 290-296.
Shepard, R. N. Recognition memory for words, sen-
tences and pictures. Journal of Verbal Learning
and Verbal Behavior, 1967, 6, 156-163.
Snow, R. E. Representativeness and quasi-repre-
sentativeness designs for research on teaching. Re-
view of Educational Research, 1973, 44, 265-291.
Wittrock, M. C. The generative processes of memory.
UCLA Educator, 1975, 17, 33-43.
Received April 26, 1976 •