The effect of two types of ads on attitude toward the advert : an experimental investigation

Abstract

This dissertation carries out a causal study between the informational/transformational dichotomy, creativity, and the attitudes towards the ad. Such constructs were used to identify the differences between an animated advert and a live action commercial produced by Red Bull. Due to the lack of empirical information on these types of advertisements, a study on the adverts‘ relationship and underlying differences in their characteristics seemed like an interesting and essential gap to fill. Through the use of a quantitative study, two surveys were used as an instrument to gather essential data about the degree of information and transformation, the attitudes of the subjects towards these ads, and how creative the subjects perceived the ads to be. The subjects were aged between 16 to 40, thereby representing the target audience of Red Bull. The results revealed that the live action ad is more transformative than the animated ad, whereas in addition, it also resulted in an attitude change. Both adverts produced equivalent results on the informational and creative aspects. It was therefore concluded that the live action ad managed to change attitude due to the emotions elicited while creativity played no role in this attitude change.