Can a word paint a thousand pictures? Brand- evoked mental imagery in advertising

| In this research we have used the logo as stimuli to test the brand-evoked mental imagery effect. According to the Dual Coding Theory, familiar brands facilitate additional pathways –visual and verbal– to retrieve arguments to build mental imagery; therefore, brand stimuli in advertising connects consumer with relevant memories and past experiences. Through an online experiment, applied to a sample of undergraduate students this study provides empirical evidence of the differences in mental imagery evoked by mobile digital advertising due to brand familiarity. The hypothesis posited that a familiar brand will be more likely to increase the ability of an ad to evoke mental image through its three dimensions: vividness, quantity, and elaboration. The individual’s ability to use imagery processing information was controlled. Results show differences in the dimensions of mental imagery due to brand familiarity. Findings suggest that below certain level of brand familiarity, mental imagery of ads may decline. Brand familiarity could enhance advertising information processing and thus the generation of visual mental imagery.

Mobile advertising represents new challenges, since the models and experiences developed for traditional media may need to be reviewed in the digital market (Truong, McColl & Kitchen, 2010;Murillo-Zegarra, Ruiz-Mafe, & Sanz-Blas, 2020). High volume of advertising inputs competing for the scarce user's attention requires mobile advertising to provide inputs that allow users, at a glance, to imaging what it would feel like to use or to consume the product, either when products are advertised or when they are sold through virtual stores. In other words, to create imagery-evoking advertising that elicits vivid, abundant, and elaborated mental images.
Mental imagery, sometimes referred to as visualizing or seeing in the mind's eye (MacInnis & Price, 1987) has the ability to influence several cognitive and affective responses as antecedents of behavioral responses to advertising messages. In the digital environment, behavioral response could be measured in terms of ad's clicks. Mental imagery is significant to advertising, due to its roles in creating expectations. In situations in which products cannot be experienced physically, evoking mental images becomes critical to influence purchase intentions (Li, Daugherty, & Biocca, 2003). These conditions apply to advertising in general but are mainly relevant when selling happens through electronic media devicesmobiles, tablets, PCs (Yoo & Kim, 2014).
Today, the challenge for marketing strategists is to create imagery-evoking advertising that helps individuals visualize, immediate and clearly, how a donut would taste, for example, or how they would look wearing a new pair of jeans or they would feel swimming in the pool of a luxurious hotel.
To do so, each aspect of the message becomes relevant to achieve these results, since the advertising stimulus is the result of the interaction of all the elementspictures, texts, and the brand. Advertising literature recognizes that pictures, such as photographs, drawing, and illustrations encourage mental imagery processing (Argyriou, 2012). gavilan, d. & avello, m. Can a word paint a thousand pictures?
However, an issue that has not yet been considered, to the best of our knowledge, is the role of the advertised brand on mental imagery elicitation. Consumers are constantly exposed to a brand's design and identity -name, logo, and signagewhether they search for, are shopping for, or using a product or service, or even throughout their everyday life (Brakus, Smith, & Zarantonello, 2009). These brand-related stimuli are an important and an easy to retrieve source of mental imagery that has not yet been analyzed, despite the influence of mental imagery on attitudinal and behavioral judgements (Lee & Gretzel, 2012). Moreover, the influence of the brand on mental imagery during the advertising processing has been deliberately controlled using fictional brand names on ad-stimuli experimental designs (Bone & Ellen, 1992;Burns et al., 1993;Unnava, Agarwal, & Haugtvedt, 1996;Miller, Hadjimarcou, & Miciak, 2000;Fennis et al., 2011;Lee & Gretzel, 2012;Chang, 2013). Under these conditions, the brand, a relevant aspect of advertising, is not present.
Therefore, when consumers engage in mobile advertising processing, they experience the advertised brand in their mind´s eye. The mental imagery evoked by the brand is believed to facilitate and assist in the persuasion process of mobile advertising. We will refer to this processing as brand-evoked mental imagery.
In this study, we explore the effect of brand-evoked mental imagery in the context of mobile advertisement. Specifically, we explore what happens to mental imagery processing (how it changes) when the brand advertised differs in familiarity (Keller, 1993;Aaker & Stayman, 1992), and how this affects the consumer's engagement in mobile ads mental imagery processing.
This research attempts to contribute to the literature by reviewing the construct of mental imagery developed for traditional media (MacInnis & Price, 1987;Bone & Ellen, 1992;Burns et al., 1993;Unnava et al., 1996;Miller et al., 2000;Fennis et al., 2011) in the digital market, providing a better understanding of mobile advertising and the mental imagery evoked by it. gavilan, d. & avello, m. Can a word paint a thousand pictures?
The study could also have practical implications for advertisers since the results provide evidence of the brand's relevance in mobile advertising processing. Brands are amongst the most valuable assets of a company (Madden, Fehle, & Fournier, 2006), and represent the main link between the company and the customer. Scholars and practitioners benefit from this asset through the development of more efficient communication strategies.
In the following sections, we present the literature review and the hypotheses, then we give detailed information about our study and, finally we conclude by specifying the research´s specific contributions and suggesting research lines in this area.

Mental Imagery Conceptual Framework
Mental imagery has been defined as "a process by which sensory information is represented in working memory" (MacInnis & Price, 1987, p. 473). This mental representation encompasses all sensory modalities: visual, auditory, olfactory, kinesthetic, gustatory, and haptic. However, research has primarily focused on the first dimension due to the dominance of visual images in our perception. Twothirds of all perceptual information that reaches the brain does so through the visual system (Zaltman, 1997). Visual processing, the personal tendency to form images, seems to be innate rather than a preference primed by situational factors (Amit, Hoeflin, Hamzah, & Federenko, 2017).
MacInnis and Price (1987) developed a conceptual framework for the study of mental imagery that was later adapted by Burns and his colleagues (1993) for research in the advertising field. This conceptual framework initially identified three constructs: imagery-eliciting stimuli as an antecedent of mental imagery, mental imagery that mediates the effect of different tactics used in advertising, and the resultant attitudinal and behavioral judgments. Bone and Ellen (1993) incorporate the study of moderator variables that modify the strength of the relationship between the stimuli and the mental imagery (figure 1). This model may need to be reviewed to meet the digital market challenges (Truong et al., 2010).
Mental imagery encompasses three main dimensions: vividness, quantity, and elaboration (Babin & Burns, 1998). Vividness refers to the clarity with which the individual experiences an image and reflects its quality, intensity, and distinctiveness (Marks, 1973). Quantity refers to the number of images that come to mind evoked by a stimulus (McGill & Anand, 1989). Elaboration refers to the activation of information, beyond that provided by the stimulus, in the generation of mental imagery (Babin & Burns, 1998).
Can a word paint a thousand pictures?

Imagery-Eliciting Stimuli: Pictures and Words
Different mechanisms have been identified that elicit mental imagery (Ha, Huang, & Park, 2019). Prior research in the advertising literature provides evidence that certain features of pictures encourage mental imagery processing, such as concrete vs. abstract (Babin & Burnes, 1997;Holmes et al., 2008); vivid vs. pallid (Fennis et al., 2011); congruent vs. incongruent (Smith & Schaffer, 2000), and nature scenes (Hartmann et al., 2013). Results suggest that concrete, vivid, congruent, and nature pictures are more efficient in their ability to generate mental imagery.

Rodero, 2010.
Ad trust Gavilan et al., 2014. Intention to revisit a web site Argyriou, 2012.  Can a word paint a thousand pictures?

Immersion experiences
In addition, research focusing on ad content suggests that transformational ads -oriented towards the experience of using/consuming the advertised brand as a personal experience-elicits more vivid and elaborated mental imagery than informational ads -oriented towards providing relevant and verifiable information about the brand. Informational ads are cognitive-based and boost analytical processing, whereas transformational ads are affect-based and facilitate the recall of the subject´s past experiences and the overlay of its own feelings and fantasies onto the scene, thus leading to a vicarious consumption experience (Myers & Sar, 2013;Gavilan et al., 2014).
In line with the idea that customers may feel as though they are physically experiencing the ad, some authors have analyzed the effect of narrative advertising, which depicts product consumption and its consequences, in association with aspects that people desire, such as romance or adventure (Escalas, 2004). Narrative advertising improves comprehension and fosters mental imagery of the depictions in the narratives (Chang, 2013).
In addition, words or written commands have been proven to stimulate mental imagery in consumer contexts (Elder & Krishna, 2010). Concrete wording is more effective than abstract wording in generating visual imagery when used in advertising (Burns et al., 1993). High imagery words are remembered better than low imagery words, and result in the formation of verbal and imaginal codes in the memory (Unnava et al., 1996).

Imagery-Eliciting Stimuli: Brand Familiarity
Brands are represented in the consumer´s memory as networks of mental representations that are linked by connections that vary in strength. Thus, brands exist as cognitive structures consisting of meanings and associations clusters (Keller, 1993;Keller, 2003).
Brand familiarity reflects a consumer's level of direct and indirect experiences with a brand (Park & Stoel, 2005). Increased brand familiarity is the result of exposure to the brand through advertisements or in a store, in addition to the prior purchase, and/or usage, of the brand. Previous research provides some insight into how brand familiarity influences the way a consumer processes the information (Hoyer & Brown, 1990), suggesting that brand familiarity may influence the recall of advertising messages (Kent & Allen, 1994). A consumer's ability to recognize the brand under different circumstances influences the likelihood of the brand coming to mind spontaneously and the ease with which it does so. Research shows that brand familiarity stimulates the recall of advertising messages (Campbell & Keller, 2003) and influences the effectiveness of the advertising appeal (Rhee & Jung, 2019).
Can a word paint a thousand pictures?
At the core of imagery processing is information retrieval. Explanations of mental imagery processing suggest that the effects of imagery stem from the availability of imaginal information based on the notion of multiple retrieval paths (Paivio, 1990).
According to Paivio's dual coding theory (1990), the nature of mental representation triggered by a stimulus is based on the notion that there are two ways into which knowledge is acquired and stored: verbal associations and visual imagery, and both can be used when recalling information (Sternberg, 2003). Familiar and well-known brands, and those whose contents appeal to the different senses and/ or combine visual and verbal encoding, facilitate additional pathways to retrieve arguments with which to build mental imagery. Likewise, brand experiences create multiple encoding processes and multiple retrieval pathways that will be used when remembering. The more information available at the time of the decision, the stronger the mental representation. Given these arguments, it is expected that brand familiarity will facilitate message processing by providing a pathway to retrieve mental images (Yu, Cho, & Johnson, 2017). Thus, we anticipate that a consumer's mental imagery (vividness, quantity, and elaboration) representation will differ when, in an ad, the same pictorial input is accompanied by a well-known, highlyreputable brand as opposed to a fictitious brand, or a brand with a dubious reputation.
The foregoing discussion of imagery and branding literature leads us to our formal hypotheses, within the advertising context :

H1.
A familiar (vs. unfamiliar) brand will be more likely to enhance the ability of a mobile ad to evoke mental imagery (vividness, quantity, and elaboration).
To test this hypothesis, we examine the differences in the three dimensions of mental imagery related to brand familiarity in three different settings: using a well-known brand, a poorly known brand, and a fictitious brand.

methodology
To test the proposed hypothesis, we designed an experiment with mobile ads. A mobile ad design of a familiar (vs. unfamiliar) brand was used to measure the evoked mental imagery through the three dimensions of mental imagery (vividness, quantity, and elaboration).
A three between-groups design with a random sample (N=95) of university students was employed to test the differences in the three dimensions of mental imagery when exposed to a pop-up mobile ad. Each version of the stimulus presented a mobile ad with the same picture but differed on the brand that signed the ad -the gavilan, d. & avello, m.
Can a word paint a thousand pictures?
logo of a well-known brand, the logo of a poorly known brand, and a fictitious brand (see appendix I). We expected that the use of a familiar brand would encourage participants to process the ad (stimuli) more thoroughly since the familiarity with the brand would make it easier to retrieve information stored in the memory. In addition, individual's ability to use imagery processing information was controlled.

Sample
Participants in this study, undergraduate students from a Marketing course at an important Spanish university (N=95, female=61.1%, male=38.9%, median age=19, cell sizes ranged from 31 to 33) were voluntarily recruited and assigned to one of the three experimental situations according to their birth date -January to April, May to August, and September to December. Students were rewarded with extra credit for their participation, and were randomly selected from a list of volunteers. A random number generation strategy was used to select participants. All participants signed their consent to form part of the study.

Stimuli and Pre-Test
Three final artworks were designed by a creative advertising executive in the form of an online advertisement; Pull & Bear was the well-known brand, Custo, the poorly known brand, and Soul Look, the fictitious brand, for which we created a logo. Aside from the brand logo, the pop-up mobile ads were copy-free (see appendix I).
To enhance the likelihood that the sample would process the target ad, when choosing the product, we initially administered a brief questionnaire to a sample of 34 undergraduate students in which we asked them about their interest in various product categories. Participants rated their level of interest in, and their degree of familiarity with, fashion and accessories, cosmetics, food and beverages, and mobile devices on a seven-point Likert scale (1 = lowest and 7 = highest). Clothes were rated highly in both dimensions (M Fashion =4.8, SD=1.44 for interest, M Fashion =5.1, SD=.85 for familiarity).
To ensure the correct manipulation of the ad content we conducted three pre-tests. First, to assess the appropriateness of the brand choice we conducted a pre-test with a sample of 35 undergraduate students -outside the sample-who rated a list of 10 clothing brands preselected from BrandZ Top. Each brand was rated on familiarity using a seven-point Likert scale (1 = lowest and 7 = highest). Pull & Bear obtained the highest score M=6.4, SD=.84) whereas Custo showed the lowest score (M=1.2, SD=.43) Then, we conducted a pre-test in the form of a classifying task to assess the adequacy of the pictures. A creative advertising executive preselected a set of 10 pictures for a clothing advertisement targeted at twenty-year-old urban youngsters. A sample of 25 subjects belonging to this target was asked to select and rank the three that gavilan, d. & avello, m.
Can a word paint a thousand pictures?
best fit with a clothing ad. The picture selected for the experiment was the favourite for 68% of the sample. Finally, we conducted a third pre-test (N=10) to evaluate the wording and understandability of the scales used in the study and the whole survey.

Main study
Participants were informed that they would be taking part in a study on digital marketing and shopping preferences. Using their own smartphones, they entered in a specific URL where the questionnaire was hosted (https://forms.gle/ XBukYYZeH3SPEWyC9). Prior to entering the questionnaire, participants gave their explicit consent to be part of the study; they were then randomly assigned to an experimental situation according to their date of birth. They were asked to complete a self-administered online questionnaire that included several questions about their familiarity with the three selected brands -well-known, poorly known, and fictitious brand-, and two other real brands. Immediately after, participants were invited to browse a digital ad for a few seconds (3-15 sec.). Afterwards, participants answered the questions about the evoked mental imagery.
Finally, participants answered a personality profile that included items about their ability to use imagery processing (since we controlled the individual's ability to use imagery processing information), and some extra questions about shopping behavior. It took them 5 to 7 minutes to fill it out the whole questionnaire. Participants were then fully debriefed and thanked for their collaboration. The study was conducted in September 2019.

Measurement scales
Brand familiarity: A three-item brand familiarity scale adapted from Kent and Allen (1994) was used. 'Regarding the brand are you:' (familiar/unfamiliar; inexperienced/experienced; knowledgeable/not knowledgeable. This was rated on a 7-point semantic differential scale (ranging from 1 = strongly low to 7 = strongly high).

Mental imagery ability:
The individual's ability to use imagery processing information was measured by the Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire (Marks, 1973). This scale distinguishes between low and high visualizers and has been used in advertising research to control for potential individual differences in the use of mental imagery during information processing (Fennis et al., 2012;Petrova & Cialdini, 2005). The scale consists of 16 items rated on a 1-5 unipolar scale ranging from 1 = no image at all, to 5 = a very clear mental image. In this study, scores of the 16 items had very high internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha = 0.81). A factor analysis yielded one major factor suggesting that Mental Imagery Ability (MIA) is a unidimensional construct and a genuine individual-differentiating internal disposition. We averaged the item scores to arrive at the individual's MIA score, which could range from 1.0 to 5.0. gavilan, d. & avello, m. Can a word paint a thousand pictures?
Mental imagery: To measure mental imagery, we adapted the scale developed by Babin and Burns (1998) consisting of three dimensions: vividness, quantity, and elaboration. Vividness refers to the clarity with which the individual experiences an image and taps into the quality aspects of evoked mental imagery (Babin & Burns, 1998;Marks, 1973). Vividness was measured using four items. Quantity of imagery refers to the number of images that come to mind while processing the information (McGill & Anand, 1989). This was measured using two items. Elaboration refers to the activation of information, beyond that provided by the stimulus, in the generation of mental imagery (Babin & Burns 1998); it was measured using two items. All items were measured using a 7-point Likert scale (ranging from 1 = strongly disagree to 7 = strongly agree).

Marks (1973)
Think of a sunset.
Visualize it.

The sun dropping toward the horizon through clouds. Last rays of light. A lightning storm breaks out . It ends and the rainbow comes out.
Think of the window display of a store you go to often. Visualize it.
The window display with details. The products in it. The store entrance . The counter where someone is shopping.
Finally, think of a nature scene.
The landscape. The colors of the trees. The water in the lake. The effect of a gust of wind on the water's surface. We then conducted an ANCOVA with the visual input as predictor, the summed and averaged scales of mental imagery as explained variables, and the individual's score of mental imagery ability (MIA) as a covariate. The goal was to test that a familiar (vs. unfamiliar) brand will be more likely to enhance the ability of a mobile ad to evoke mental imagery (vividness, quantity, and elaboration).

results
Manipulation check: The results show that the ad manipulation was successful (F(2,94)=479.53, p <.000). Participants exposed to the familiar brand ad (Pull & Bear) scored M HFamBrand 1 =5.91, SD=1.01; participants exposed to the low familiar brand ad (Custo) scored M LFamBrand 2 =1.39, SD=.62; all the participants exposed to the fictitious brand ad (Soul Look) admitted their lack of familiarity (M Mental imagery scale: The eight items of the mental imagery scale were subjected to principal component analysis (PCA). The KMO value was .796, and Bartlett's Test of Sphericity was significant (p<.000). The number of extracted factors with eigenvalues equal to or greater than one was three. All items were assessed on the appropriate factor with factor loadings higher than .6. Reliability was measured with Cronbach's alpha = .878 (Nunnally, 1978). The scale was summed and averaged (M_IMAGERY) to form an index of mental imagery to be used in further analysis. The scale was also summed and averaged to form several indexes of imagery according to their dimensions (vividness, quantity, elaboration).
Brand-evoked imagery effect: an ANCOVA was run with the visual input as predictor, the summed and averaged scales of mental imagery as explained variables, and the individual's score of mental imagery ability (MIA) as a covariate.
The assumption of the homogeneity of the regression slopes (Input * MIA p>.05), the independence of the independent variable and covariate, and the lack of significance of Leven's test (p>.05) were fully satisfied.
The results indicate that the covariate -the individual's mental imagery ability (MIA)-is significantly related to mental imagery, F(1,91)=6.655, p<.05 and exerts a positive effect, as expected. There is also a significant effect of the visual input on levels of mental imagery, F(2,91) = 10.361, p<.00.
Pairwise comparisons revealed that an ad containing a familiar brand significantly increased the evoked mental imagery compared to the same ad containing either a low familiar brand (p=.013) or a fictitious brand (p<.000). However, it is interesting to notice that the difference between the low familiar brand and the fictitious brand is not significant (p=.276) (see figure 2). This result suggests that brand familiarity plays a significant role while processing advertising.
We then conducted a MANCOVA with the three dimensions of mental imagery (vividness, quantity, and elaboration) as dependent variables and the three visual inputs as predictors (table 2). The MANCOVA results indicate that MIA is significantly related to the vividness and elaboration dimension of mental imagery, but not to the quantity dimension. On the other hand, the visual input (digital ad) exerted a significant influence on the three dimensions of mental imagery (table 3).  Pairwise comparisons show that the presence of a high familiar brand significantly increases the vividness of mental imagery. Differences arise between ads of real brands -either of high or low familiarity (p=.52)-and ads of a fictitious brand (p<.00) (see figure 3).
Regarding the quantity dimension of mental images, the effect of familiarity increases it when comparing high familiar brand ads to low familiar brand ads (p=.045), as well as when comparing high familiar brand ads to fictitious brand ads (p=.002). Nevertheless, there is no significant difference between low familiar brand ads and fictitious brand ads (p=.612).
Lastly, brand familiarity significantly impacts the elaboration of mental imagery only when comparing high familiar brand ads to a fictitious brand ad (p=.025).   These results confirm the influence of brand familiarity on mental imagery. They also suggest that the difficulties in eliciting mental imagery emerge from the lack of familiarity with the brand; in other words, below certain levels of brand familiarity, mental imagery of ads suffers.

discussion and conclusions
The goal of this research was to explore the role of brand familiarity on mental imagery in the context of digital advertising, the so-called brand-evoked mental imagery. Findings shows that a brand can exert a significant influence on mental imagery when processing advertising. Familiarity with the brand helps the ad to be more thoroughly processed, since brand familiarity makes it easier to retrieve information stored in the memory. On the contrary, the lack of familiarity with the brand seems to be a barrier to eliciting vivid, numerous, and elaborated mental images.
Brand presence may act as a sort of anchor on mental imagery processing. Exceptionally, brand familiarity, even at low levels, enable to create better quality images: this is vividness. Concerning quantity, referred to the number of images that come to mind evoked by a stimulus, and elaboration, which measures the activation of information beyond what the stimulus provides, both significantly  decrease when brand familiarity does not reach a sufficient level. This means that the brand connects consumers with relevant memories and past brand experiences.
Regarding mental imagery ability, the significant influence of MIA has already been supported in literature (Fennis et al., 2012), as it happened in this research.
Brand-evoked mental imagery is a type of thought, generated in consumers as a consequence of branding, which arises from the need to respond to the demands of the external world and facilitates the processing of advertising. The relevance of mental imagery has already been tested. Consumers proactively use imagery as part of their approach to making purchase decisions.
Theoretically, this work contributes directly to the communications and persuasion literature on mental imagery (MacInnis & Price, 1987;Bone & Ellen, 1992;Burns et al., 1993;Unnava et al., 1996;Miller, 2000;Fennis et al., 2011), increasing the knowledge about antecedents of mental imagery in digital contexts. More generally, it adds to branding literature since the brand-evoked mental imagery effect is the result of the branding process. A relevant implication of this study is that it indicates that it is worthwhile to consider the dimensionality of the mental imagery construct. Even though vividness is frequently used as a mental imagery proxy, focusing on each dimension provides a deeper understanding of the underlying dynamics. In fact, low levels of brand familiarity damage quantity and elaboration before vividness.
This study differs from previous research on mental imagery processing in the field of advertising. Previous research has shown that mental imagery elicited by advertising exerts a positive influence on building brand attitude (Bone & Ellen, 1992;Burns et al., 1993;Unnava et al., 1996;Babin & Burns, 1997;Chang, 2013). However, those studies were developed using fictitious brands. Our results do not contradict prior studies, but rather analyze a situation that actually exists: when consumers face advertising, the brand could be already known and sometimes consumers even have a previous experience with it. Therefore, familiarity facilitates the creation of vivid, numerous, and elaborated mental imagery.
In line with this research, another interesting area for future research would be to analyze moderator variables of brand-evoked mental imagery. Since brand is a multidimensional concept, certain brand dimensions could moderate this effect. For example, brand favorability -referred as the brand's ability to provoke positive feelings about itself-would exert a significant effect on mental imagery, since cognitive elaboration of imagery representations depends on the favorableness of the information available in the memory (Kisielius & Sternthal, 1986). Mental imagery stems from sensory information and could increase in consonance gavilan, d. & avello, m. Can a word paint a thousand pictures?
with the availability of favorable information provided in the message. As long as brand familiarity, moderated by brand favorability, increases, it would be interesting to gauge to what extent mental imagery processing becomes more vivid, numerous, and elaborated.
Likewise, congruency between the ad and the brand could enhance mental imagery because congruent messages facilitate message processing by catching the consumers' attention and priming relevant information stored in their memory (Smith & Shaffer, 2000).
This study is not exempt of limitations. We did not collect any data regarding the effect of mental imagery in consumer response to the mobile ad. Both in our conceptual development and in our experimental designs, we have tried to keep our context as simple and as clean as possible, deliberately avoiding studying any cognitive, attitudinal, and behavioral response to mental imagery. However, this decision has been supported on the evidence provided in literature. Mental imagery increases attention (Rodero, 2012), ad recall and attitude towards the ad (Chang, 2013), brand beliefs and recall (Mikhailitchenko et al., 2009), and emotions (Suess & Abdel Rahman, 2015). In the digital environment, researchers have also shown that mental imagery increases advertising trust (Gavilan et al., 2014), intention to purchase in the web (Argyriou, 2012), and immersion experiences (Derbaix & Gombault, 2016).
In this research, we have used the logo as stimuli to test the brand-evoked mental imagery effect. The logo is used to represent the brand, because the design of the logo encompasses certain traits of it. The ability of the logo to evoke content has been tested; for instance, Cian, Krishna, and Elder (2014) provide evidence of how a logo´s graphic design is able to express dynamism through what they called dynamic imagery. It would be interesting to conduct further research along these lines on the logo influence, which merges both a visual and a cognitive code, and the impact of the brand name without a graphical representation. Future research is needed to analyzed differences among brands due to the level of familiarity.
Mental imagery is influenced by branding. Based on this research, it could be said that the mere presence of the brand triggers a wealth of thoughts and emotions when the subjects may connect the brand with their knowledges, and the feelings that it arises in a life full of experiences.
They say that a picture paints a thousand words. Maybe certain words, when referring to brands, also paint a thousand pictures in our minds. gavilan, d. & avello, m. Can a word paint a thousand pictures?