Individual Submission Summary
Share...

Direct link:

Gruesomeness and Recall in Graphic Warning Labels: Does Length of Visual Attention Matter?

Fri, May 25, 11:00 to 12:15, Hilton Prague, Floor: LL, Congress Hall III

Abstract

Graphic warning labels on cigarette packages are expected to make warnings more memorable to viewers. The more vivid the image, the more memorable the warning should be. We conducted a within-subjects experiment to test whether this hypothesis holds for gruesome, disgust-eliciting images, such as those depicting diseased lungs, compared to warnings without such images. Using eye tracking, we examined the relationship between youth and adult participants’ attention to both types of warnings and their recall of each. Participants’ mean probability of recall was greater for the gruesome warnings as hypothesized. However, youth looked at the gruesome warnings for less time than the non-gruesome warnings. There was no difference in the length of time adults looked at the gruesome and non-gruesome warnings. Recall was not predicted by attention for either group. One possible explanation for these findings is that gruesome images are memorable regardless of how long participants look at them.

Authors