Review of Attention and interest factors in advertising

Abstract

Reviews the book, Attention and interest factors in advertising by Harold J. Rudolph (1947). For many years Daniel Starch and staff have compiled magazine readership ratings using the recognition method. The question frequently has been asked, just what do the Starch studies prove? Mr. Rudolph attempts to answer this question, at least in part, and in so doing has presented research findings which throw considerable light on the relative value of a number of present-day advertising techniques. Consumers' reactions to 2,500 different half and full page advertisements appearing in The Saturday Evening Post between the years 1935 through 1939 make up the original data for the studies reported. In analyzing these data Mr. Rudolph exhibits an unusual ability to isolate and control a surprising number of factors in advertising. If the book did nothing more than show how such extremely complex data can be brought under scientific control it would have served a worthwhile purpose; but it does more than that. It produces answers to more than thirty advertising problems, such as relative value of half and full page ads, the best "spot" for a headline, sex preferences for various types of illustrations, and the like. The statistically trained research worker reading this book will find the lack of "N's" and measures of significance of differences a serious shortcoming. While the author emphasizes the specificity of the problems dealt with, it may be well to stress further the fact that the techniques investigated are concerned primarily with the mechanical aspects of advertising. If one believes mechanical perfection will make a successful advertisement, then this book is an extremely important contribution to advertising. If, however, one follows Kenneth Goode, H. C Link, and others who hold that mechanical factors, while important, are decidedly secondary to the advertiser's ability to tap deep undercurrents of human motives, then the importance of this book is whittled down considerably. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved)