Multimodal emotional arousal in city image promotional videos: A comparative analysis using self-report and electrodermal activity

This study examines emotional arousal evoked by city image promotional videos by combining self-reported arousal with electrodermal activity (EDA). Using four Hangzhou city image promotional videos representing theme-oriented, non-theme-oriented, panoramic comprehensive, and narrative types, the study evaluates whether subjective and autonomic indicators provide convergent or complementary information in an applied city branding context. The results show that self-reported arousal and EDA-based autonomic arousal did not exhibit stable statistically significant coupling after multiplicity correction. At the factor level, EDA-based arousal was primarily sensitive to theme orientation, whereas self-reported arousal was sensitive to the panoramic narrative dimension and its interaction with theme orientation. Rather than offering a general theory of emotional processing, the findings indicate that in city promotional video evaluation, self-report and EDA capture partly different aspects of audience response and should be interpreted as complementary measurement channels. These results contribute to tourism marketing and city image communication by demonstrating how multimodal emotion measurement can support more nuanced evaluation of promotional video types.