Salient Effects of Publicity in Advertised Brand Recall and Recognition: The List-Strength Paradigm

Previous research has demonstrated that preexposure of publicity about advertising campaigns facilitates recall of subsequently advertised brands. In this paper, we investigate the potential inhibitive effect; that is, preexposure of publicity can suppress retrieval of other nonpublicized brands that would otherwise have been retrieved. The inhibitive effect was examined in the list-strength paradigm, which posits that strengthened items in a list inhibit memory for nonstrengthened items. We found the inhibitive effect of publicity in free recall. The inhibition was not found in recognition memory, however. This study also examines the effect of publicity on the criterion placement in recognition tests. Integrated marketing communication (IMC) and its implications are discussed.