The Influence of Phonetic Symbolism on Memory for Advertisements

Abstract

This experiment investigated the influence of phonetic symbolism on memory in the context of a marketing study. Participants first judged the appeal and probable success of advertisements for large and small products that were paired either congruently or incongruently with nonword brand names according to size, and then completed surprise recall and recognition tasks about the brand names, products, and pairings. It was predicted that participants would have better memory for brand names, products, and pairings that displayed a congruent vs. incongruent relationship between the associated size of the brand name vowel and the size of the product. The results showed some support for these hypotheses, but primarily for back vowellarge product pairings. These findings suggest that using phonetic symbolism in brand names for large products will result in consumers having better memory for those brand names and products, which has implications for how companies name and advertise future products