What is it about?

fMRI is used in order to explore differences in brain functioning between national brands and own-labels. National brands are the brands used by the manufacturers to mark their products and services, while own-labels are owned by a distributor, who usually is not a manufacturer. fMRI is a neuroscientific technique used to reveal which parts of the brain are active (participate) in a task. The influence of price is also studied. We found different brain supports for these two categories of brands, and also for the influence of price. Price was found to drive buying decisions.

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Why is it important?

It is the first time that the brain maps of national brands and own-labels are drawn. Hence the psychological processes that participate in the perception of these brands may be addressed based on neural supports. Usually it is assumed that brand decision is a pipeline-like process: closely to the end the consumer decides if s/he buys a national branded product or marked with an own-label. Our results suggest that this model does not have neural support. It suggests however that the decision is made early in the process (participation of visual and visual associative brain areas). Hence, there should be two pipelines, one for each brand category, which in turn suggests that the psychological processes involved in brands’ decisions are different.

Perspectives

So far, brand decision has been conceived like an algorithm. Our results suggest that the decision process is more complex, at least with respect to brain function. I expect that this research on neuromarketing paves the way for new theories of brand perception (now brain-based theories). I remark the participation of visual associative areas (quite early in the process) in brand decision.

Dr. Jose Paulo Marques dos Santos
Universidade do Porto

Read the Original

This page is a summary of: Neural imprints of national brands versus own-label brands, Journal of Product & Brand Management, April 2016, Emerald,
DOI: 10.1108/jpbm-12-2014-0756.
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