Getting the User’s Attention: The Effectiveness of Two Mediumsof Online Advertising

Katherine Hinds1 Mandy Elkins2 Steve Pautz3 Chris Coker4 DaveOrr5

Abstract

While the Internet has become an increasingly popularmedium for advertising, few studies have beenperformed to gauge Internet advertising’s effectivenessin terms of increasing user attention to the advertisementand promoting memory for the content of the ads. Thepresent study compared two types of banneradvertisements in terms of capturing user attention,increasing recognition memory for the content of theadvertisements, and in promoting positive attitudestoward the advertisements. Participants engaged in asearch task on a simulated web page. An eye tracker wasused to collect data on how effective the advertisementswere in capturing user attention as indicated by thenumber of fixations participants’ made on the body ofthe ads. A recognition task provided a measure ofimplicit memory for the content of the ads. Finally, anattitude survey assessed how participants felt about theadvertisements’ presence during the experiment. Theresults of the study indicate that neither type of bannercan be preferred over the other in terms of increasinguser attention to the ad, promoting recognition memory,and increasing positive attitudes toward the ad.

1 Background

Soon after the Internet was developed, companiessought to take advantage of the new interactive mediumby advertising to promote their products. Banner adsappeared to be effective in creating brand awareness andpositive consumer attitudes toward advertised productsduring early studies of Internet advertising [Goldsmith& Lafferty, 2002]. However, advertising on the Internethas since been attacked as, “uninformative, unfocused,forgettable, and generally ineffective” [Goldsmith &Lafferty, 2002]. Despite these criticisms, spending onInternet advertising among major companies is expectedto total $6.3 billion at the close of 2003, with projectedspending totals close to $8.1 billion by 2006[Greenspan, 2003]. There is a substantial need toinvestigate how effective Internet advertising is towardpromoting brand awareness and positive consumerattitudes toward the advertised product.

The goals of Internet advertising are, for the most part,identical to those of more traditional mediums ofadvertising. One of the goals of Internet advertising isfor the consumer to “form positive attitudes toward thead and the brand being advertised, thus increasing thelikelihood of purchase” [Goldsmith & Lafferty, 2002]. Asecond goal of Internet advertising is to promote brand

awareness. Brand awareness helps ensure that recalledbrands will have a competitive advantage over thosebrands that are not easily recalled [Goldsmith &Lafferty, 2002]. Promoting brand awareness is not aneasy task for Internet advertisers as there are thousandsof sources of information competing for a user’sattention as they browse the Web. As a result,companies must design advertisements that are likely toattract the user’s attention.

Two of the most popular forms of advertising on theInternet are the banner advertisement and the pop-upadvertisement. The present study compared theeffectiveness of two types of banner advertisements incapturing the user’s attention and promoting brandawareness for the advertised products. The study wasconducted using a simulated web browsing task duringwhich participants were exposed to either banneradvertisements that display a continuous image (staticbanner advertisements) or banner advertisements thatalternate images every two seconds (alternating banneradvertisements). Data pertaining to the advertisements’effectiveness was collected using an eye tracker, arecognition task, and an attitude survey. Data pertainingto the advertisements’ effect on the users’ web browsingtask was also collected. When users engage in a tasksuch as searching for information on a web site theymust operate under conditions of divided attention, withtheir attention allocated to many objects of interest.Research has provided significant evidence for a parallelpreattentive process that continually organizes the worldinto objects and groups of objects [Wickens & Hollands,2000]. Users then selectively attend to certain objectsfrom these preattentive groupings. Problems withdivided attention can occur when users fail to direct theirattention to important items within these preattentivegroupings.

Mack and Rock [1998] found empirical evidence forfailures of parallel processing during their studies of aphenomenon they named inattentional blindness.Theories of inattentional blindness contradict the ideathat perception of objects can occur without attention.Mack and Rock’s research paradigm consisted of a crosspresented briefly on a display either at a fixation point atthe center of the display or parafovally. On each trial,

1 e-mail: hindsk@clemson.edu2 e-mail: elkinsa@clemson.edu3 e-mail: spautz@clemson.edu4 e-mail: clocker@clemson.edu5 e-mail: dorr@clemson.edu

participants were asked to name the longer arm of thecross after it was presented. On the third and fourth trialsthe critical stimulus, a small dot, was presentedunexpectedly in one of the four quadrants of the cross atthe same time that the cross was displayed. During thecourse of their research, Mack and Rock found that asignificant number of participants in each test groupfailed to detect the critical stimulus during theexperimental trials, even when it was presented at thefixation point. In fact, the amount of inattentionalblindness exhibited by participants doubled for stimulipresented at the fixation point. Implicit divided attentiontrials revealed that the critical stimulus was perceptiblewhen participants were aware an unexpected eventmight occur.

This finding may indicate that subjects actively inhibitedinput from objects at the fixation point in order to attendto objects presented away from the fixation point [Mack& Rock, 1998]. The research suggests that users mayemploy active cognitive processes to attend to certainstimuli and inhibit others [Mack & Rock, 1998].

Strayer, Drews and Johnson [2003] found additionalevidence for failures of parallel processing in theirresearch concerning the use of cellular phones whiledriving. In their experimental task, participants drove ona simulated highway while either engaged in a hands-free cell phone conversation or not engaged in a cellphone conversation. At the conclusion of theexperiment, participants were tested for recognition offifteen billboard advertisements that were present alongthe highway during the simulated driving task. Therecognition test revealed that participants who drove thesimulated highway while conversing on the cell phoneshowed impaired memory for the billboardadvertisements. A later experiment by Strayer et al.[2003] measured eye fixations using an eye trackerwhile participants drove the same simulated highway asin the previous experiment. During the experiment,participants in both groups fixated on approximately twothirds of the billboards. However, recognition memoryfor the fixated billboards by those participants whoengaged in the cell phone conversation while drivingwas still impaired. Conversing on the cell phonedisrupted performance on the driving task by divertingattention from the driving task to the cell phoneconversation, a failure of divided attention [Strayer etal., 2003].

Eye movement research conducted on searchingbehavior on the Internet has found that most users scanthe environment for desired information rather thanprocessing each available item independently. Shortsurvey dwells are eye fixations used to establish thoseregions that are most likely to contain a target, whilelonger examination dwells are used to provide a detailedexamination of a region [Wickens & Hollands, 2000].Research by Most et al. [2001] provided evidence thatusers may guide their search for targets in a display bydeveloping a perceptual set of required characteristicsfor the target. Detection of an object may then be

dependent on whether the object possesses the requiredfeatures [Most et al., 2001]. In Most’s researchparadigm, black and white L and T shapes moved acrossa display in a random pattern. On each trial, participantsin the study fixated on a central point in the display andsilently kept a tally of the total number of times eitherwhite or black shapes bounced off the edges of thedisplay window. Five seconds into the third trial of theexperiment, a cross entered the right side of the window,moved in a path horizontally across the screen behindthe fixation point, and exited the left side of the display.The luminance of the cross varied among theexperimental conditions as either black, dark gray, lightgray, or white. When the unexpected cross had the sameluminance as the attended items, almost all observersnoticed it. When the cross had the same luminance asthe ignored items, almost no participants noticed it. Themore similar the cross was to the attended items and themore it differed from the ignored items, the more likelyit was to be detected. This provides strong support forthe idea that a perceptual set of expected features for atarget can guide user attention to objects.

In a third experiment by Most et al., identical inprocedure to the experiment outlined above, participantsattended to either black or white circles and squaresagainst a gray background. The cross was colored redand moved across the display in the same fashion as inthe previously described experiment. In this experiment,however, the unexpected cross differed from theattended items in both shape and color. Only 72% ofparticipants noticed the red cross on the critical trial.This research provided evidence that inattentionalblindness can occur even for sustained and highly salientevents in a display, provided that users are engaged in aselective attention task.

Research by Benway and Lane [1998] revealed oneperceptual set users exhibit while viewing a web pagethat causes selective ignoring of banner advertisementsand banner-type objects. In Benway and Lane’s firstexperiment, participants searched for answers to twenty-four questions on a web site. In the control tasks, theanswers to the questions could be found using textmenus on the site. In the experimental tasks, the answersto the questions could only be found by viewing andclicking on red advertisement-style banners. Participantsfound the answers to the experimental task questionsonly 58% of the time, while the answers to the controltasks were found 94% of the time. Benway and Laneexplained these results by noting that participants mayhave learned to ignore banners while searching forinformation, a form of inattentional blindness theydubbed “banner blindness” [Benway & Lane, 1998, p.2].

One possible reason that users may ignore banners isthat they are perceptually grouped in a different categorythan text. Benway and Lane [1998] increased theperceptual grouping of the text on the web page and thebanner-style link in a second experiment in an attempt toincrease user attention to the banner objects. In the menugrouping condition, the banner was perceptually

grouped with the text menu on the web site by means ofa similar background color, while in the title groupingcondition the banner was perceptually separated fromthe text menu by means of a different background color.In a third condition, the banner contained the same textas in the other two conditions but resembled anadvertisement banner in its graphic style. Only 17 of the71 participants reported seeing the non-advertisementbanners, while only twenty percent of the participantsreported they saw any advertisements at all during thecourse of the experimental trials [Benway & Lane,1998]. Benway and Lane’s research provided evidencethat user expectation and perceptual set may influencewhat areas of the screen they attend to while searchingfor information on the Internet. Mental models of webspace, based on the probable locations of valuableinformation from prior experience, may guide usersampling of different areas of a web page [Wickens &Hollands, 2000].

Though users often employ top-down processes to guidetheir search of a web space, some have argued that abottom-up, or stimulus driven, approach to advertisingmay succeed in capturing user attention. Findings fromprior research have suggested that making a stimulusbright, large, colorful, or otherwise salient may succeedin capturing user attention [Wickens & Hollands, 2000].Motion is one attribute that is often thought to captureattention. Yantis and Hillstrom [1994] conductedresearch using search arrays to determine whethermotion can capture attention. During the course of theirexperiment, users were presented with a large globalletter that was composed of smaller letters, for example,a large S composed of small T’s. Participants wereasked to name the identity of the global letter aloud. Onsome of the trials, one of the smaller letters exhibitedmotion after its appearance on the screen. Participants’response to the naming of the global letter was slowerduring the motion conditions [Yantis & Hillstrom,1994].

Yantis and Hillstrom’s findings support the new-objecthypothesis, which states that motion captures attentionwhen it requires the creation of a new object file (avisual representation of a perceptual object containingvarious attributes of the object such as its color, shape,or motion state). When a change in a scene occurs, thescene may be resegmented and an object file may becreated for each new object, with new objectsautomatically receiving high attentional priority [Yantis& Hillstrom, 1994]. The new object hypothesis suggeststhat pop-up advertisements and banner ads that alternatebetween different images are more likely to captureattention since they produce changes in a visual scene.

The previous research has established that users viewweb pages with a perceptual set of what types of itemsare likely to be found in certain areas of a web page.Also, when users selectively attend to some items whileengaged in a task, they are likely to miss other items thatare dissimilar to the attended items. However, items thatappear on a page with abrupt visual onsets may capture

attention and thus overcome these limits of selectiveattention. In light of these findings, it is predicted thatusers in the present study will remember little about thecontent of the static banner advertisements and willremember more of the content of the alternating banneradvertisements. Participants will remember less of thecontent from the static banner advertisement as they willbe engaged in a selective attention task and are thereforelikely to exhibit “banner blindness” similar to that foundby Benway and Lane [1998] in their research.Participants are more likely to remember content fromthe alternating banner advertisements since the abruptonset of a new image is more likely to capture users’attention, and therefore promote some processing of theinformation contained in the advertisement body, thanthe static banner advertisements.

It is predicted that participants will have their attentioncaptured more quickly by the alternating banneradvertisements. Since the alternating banneradvertisement is likely to cause the generation of a newobject file and new objects are automatically assignedhigh attentional priority, this high priority will beexhibited by more total fixations on the body of thealternating banner ad. Participants in the static bannercondition will likely make fewer total fixations on thebody of the ad due to “banner blindness”. Participantswill likely take longer to complete the search task in thealternating banner condition due to the attentioncapturing properties of the ad. This finding would besimilar to those from Yantis and Hillstrom’s research,which found the movement of a smaller letter delayedparticipant’s response to naming the identity of a largerglobal letter [Yantis & Hillstrom, 1994]. The search taskis less likely to be slowed by the static banneradvertisement due to “banner blindness.”

Finally, participants are expected to exhibit a negativeattitude toward the alternating banner advertisementsand a more neutral attitude toward the static banneradvertisements. The attention capturing properties of thealternating banner advertisement and its likelihood ofslowing the completion of the search task will causeparticipants to feel more negatively toward thealternating banner ads. The static banner advertisementsare less likely to be noticed by participants and will haveless of an effect on their completion of the search task.Therefore, participants will feel more positively abouttheir presence.

The present study was conducted using an ISCAN eyetracker to measure how many times participants fixatedon the body of the ads. This measure provided anindication as to how effective the advertisements were incapturing participants’ attention. A recognition memorytask indicated how effective the advertisements were inpromoting implicit memory for content of the ads.Finally, an attitude questionnaire assessed howbothersome the advertisements were to the participantsand their perception of how the ads’ presence affectedtheir performance on the search tasks.

2 Method

2.1 Participants

The study was conducted with 10 participants, 2 maleand 8 female, with an age range of 18 to 21. A between-subjects design was used, with one group of fiveparticipants exposed to only static banneradvertisements and a second group of five participantsexposed to only alternating banner advertisements.Participants were randomly assigned to either the staticbanner group or the alternating banner group. Twoparticipants’ eye movement data was unable to beanalyzed, and so was not included during data analysis.

2.2 Materials

The experiment was conducted using a series of imagesdesigned to replicate an Internet news site, the HeraldOnline (www.heraldonline.com). The images appearedsimilar to Internet web pages and included text areas andbutton areas that the user can click with their mouse.Clicking a button present on an image transported theparticipant to another image. In this fashion, the series ofimages served to replicate the Internet experiencewithout the use of an Internet browser. Each usertraversed the series of images while attempting toanswer six questions. An example of a question that wasasked is, “What recipes did Janet Oyler contribute to thecookbook about Carolina food?”

Figure 1. Experimental Website

The images used for the static banner condition and thealternating banner condition remained identical with theexception of the type of banner advertisement present. Inboth conditions the banner advertisement was presentedin the top center of the image, which is the mostcommon location for banner advertisements on theInternet.

There were six banners presented during the course ofthe experiment, each banner advertising a differentproduct. To minimize the chance of previous exposureto the advertised products, the banner advertisements

displayed information about events and businesses localto a place other than where the experiment takes place,rather than nationwide businesses or products. The orderin which the advertisements were presented toparticipants was randomized using a Latin Squaredesign.

The alternating banner advertisements consisted of twodifferently formatted advertisements for the sameproduct. The content of the advertisements did notchange between the two images, but the content’sposition on the body of the ad changed. The adsalternated images every two seconds and exhibited cutreplacement, with the second ad instantly replacing thefirst ad to produce an abrupt onset of the second adimage. An example set of two images used to create analternating banner advertisement can be viewed inFigure 2.

A 60 Hz ISCAN video-based pupil tracking system wasused to monitor where the participant is looking on thescreen. The eye tracker used was non-obtrusive and didnot require the participant to wear any equipment duringits use.

Figure 2. Alternating Banner Advertisement

A questionnaire was presented at the conclusion of theexperiment. The questionnaire measured participants’attitudes toward the advertisements they encounteredduring the experiment. The survey assessed theirattitudes using questions to determine to what extentthey considered the ads distracting and if they felt thatthe presence of the advertisements slowed their work asthey searched for the answers to the six experimentalquestions. Attitude survey questions were answeredusing a 5-point Likert type scale.

A recognition task for the advertisements that werepresented during the course of the experiment was givenimmediately after the completion of the search task. Therecognition task used was similar to that used byStrayer, Drews and Johnson to test recognition memoryfor billboard advertisements [Strayer et al., 2003].During the recognition task, users were presented withtwelve images of banner advertisements on a computermonitor. Six of these advertisements were presentduring the course of the experiment and six of thesewere not. The task prompted users to indicate if theadvertisement presented was on the screen at any timeduring the experiment using “yes” and “no” buttonspresent on the screen. The recognition task was scored

as a ratio of the percentage of correct “no” responses toads that were not present in the study (probability offalse alarms) to the percentage of correct “yes”responses to ads that were present in the study(probability of hits). The average of these twopercentages yielded a percentage of correct signaldetection. The following formula was used in dataanalysis:

P(A) = P(Hits) – [1- P(False Alarms)] 2

Participant signal detection scores were compared to abaseline of 50%, which represents the score for chanceperformance on the recognition task.

2.3 Procedure

When participants arrived at the laboratory they weregiven a consent form inviting them to participate in astudy concerning how people read text on the Internet.They were then seated in front of a computer andperformed a short calibration procedure for the eyetracker. Participants kept their chin in a headrest duringthe entire experiment in order to minimize headmovement. Participants were then instructed as to howto complete the experiment. They were given sixquestions, one at a time, and asked to find the answer tothe question using the website presented to them.Experimental questions were presented in the sameorder for all participants. Each question was read aloudto the participant, and questions were repeated ifnecessary. Participants began their search immediatelyafter each question was read aloud and clicked a “Done”button present on the screen before verbally stating theanswer they found. They were allowed unlimited time toanswer each question, but they were asked to find eachanswer in a timely manner while remaining accurate. Aquestion was considered completed when the participantclicked the “Done” button on the screen before theystated the answer to the question. Participants receivedno feedback as to the correctness of their response. Theythen returned to the home page of the website and waspresented with another question. Participants whoanswered a question incorrectly were allowed to moveon to the next question. The experiment proceeded inthis fashion until all six questions had been answered.Participant search times for each question weredetermined using the difference between the start time,when the experimenter completed reading the questionaloud, and the end time, when the participant clicked the“Done” button before answering the question verbally.All times were measured with a stopwatch.

During the course of the experiment, participants werepresented with six advertisements, each advertising adifferent product. None of the answers to theexperimental questions were able to be answered usingthe text present in the advertisements. The eye trackerwas used to determine how many total fixations theparticipant performed on the advertisement body. Aminimum of 150 milliseconds was used to qualify as afixation. Each question had one of the six

advertisements present in the top center of the screenduring the entire time the participant searched for theanswer to the question. The ad remained in the topcenter of the screen until the participant clicked the“Done” button indicating they had found the answer tothe question. The advertisement present then changed toanother of the six experimental banners when theparticipant returned to the home page to begin anotherquestion. This advertisement then remained on thescreen until the participant completed the question byclicking the “Done” button. Each advertisement wasused only once during the course of the experiment.

Following the completion of the last question, eachparticipant first completed the recognition task on acomputer, which asked them to indicate which banneradvertisements of the twelve presented to them had beenpresent on the screen at any time during the course ofthe experiment. Finally, participants completed anattitude survey. Following the attitude survey,participants were debriefed as to the purpose of theexperiment.

3 Results

T-tests were used to measure the difference in the totalnumber of fixations performed on the advertisementsbetween the alternating banner group and the staticbanner group. Figure 3 below indicates the averagenumber of fixations on the six banner advertisementsduring the entire course of the experiment by membersof the static banner group and members of thealternating banner group. As can be seen in the figure,members of the static banner group made an average of43 fixations on the banner advertisements (SD=54.19)and members on the alternating banner group made anaverage of 166 fixations on the banner advertisements(SD = 224.8). Members of the alternating banner groupdid not make significantly more fixations on theadvertisements than members of the static banner group,p= 0.27. An example scanpath over an image by amember of the alternating banner group can be viewedin Figure 7.

43.6

166.4

105

020406080

100120140160180

static alt. Total

Figure 3. Average Number of Fixations for EachType of Banner Advertisement

The recognition task was scored as a ratio of correctsignal detection (hits) and a ratio of false alarms. A hit

was scored whenever a participant correctly indicated abanner advertisement that had been present during theexperiment as being present. A false alarm was scoredwhenever a participant incorrectly indicated a bannerthat had not been present during the experiment as beingpresent. The ratios for the hit detection and false alarmscores were compared to a baseline of 0.50, whichrepresents chance performance. The static banner groupexhibited better signal detection ratios in bothprobability of hits (0.19) and probability of false alarms(0.10). The alternating banner group exhibited signaldetection ratios close to chance, with the probability ofhits being 0.35 and the probability of false alarms being0.44.

Figure 5 illustrates the mean search times for the sixexperimental questions for the alternating banner groupand the static banner group. T-tests were used todetermine if there was a significant (p< 0.05) differencein the mean search times between the groups. As can beseen in the figure, the alternating banner group had asignificantly higher total mean search time for the sixexperimental questions compared to the static bannergroup, with the alternating banner group taking anaverage of 343 seconds for six experimental questionsand the static banner group taking an average of 291seconds to complete the six experimental questions,p=0.04. While the total mean search time for thequestions was significantly different, individualcomparisons for each of the question means between thegroups were not significant. The mean search times (inseconds) for each of the six experimental questions bygroup can be viewed in Figure 5.

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q5 Q6 Total

Sec

on

ds

Static Alternating

Figure 4. Average Search Time for ExperimentalQuestions

The answers to each of the attitude survey questionswere analyzed using t-tests to compare the answersbetween the alternating banner group and the staticbanner group. Participants answered each question on a5 point Likert-type scale, with 1 meaning “stronglydisagree”, 2 meaning “disagree”, 3 meaning “neitheragree or disagree”, 4 meaning “agree”, and 5 meaning“strongly agree”. Question 1 asked participants if theythought they noticed the advertisement banners duringthe experiment. The mean for this question did not differsignificantly between the groups, with the alternatinggroup indicating a mean of 1.8 (SD=0.8) and the static

group indicating a mean of 2.2 (SD=1.3), p=0.257.Question 2 asked participants to indicate whether theyfound the advertisements to be distracting while theysearched for answers to the experimental questions. Themean for this question did not differ significantlybetween the groups, with the alternating groupindicating a mean of 1.8 (SD=0.8) and the static groupindicating a mean of 1.8 (SD=1.3), p=0.428. Question 3asked participants to indicate whether they thought theadvertisements slowed their progress in completing theexperimental questions. The mean for this question alsodid not differ significantly between the groups, with thealternating group indicating a mean of 1.6 (SD=0.8) andthe static group indicating a mean of 1.8 (SD=1.1),p=0.264. The means for each of the attitude surveyquestions can be viewed in Figure 6.

Static Alternating t-test significanceQ1 44.60

(SD=53.3)26.00

(SD=8.9).062

Q2 37.40(SD=11.5)

35.40(SD=14.5)

.942

Q3 34.00(SD=11.1

35.80(SD=20.7)

.414

Q4 31.40(SD=24.4)

63.80(SD=41.7)

.363

Q5 87.80(SD=51.8)

110.4(SD=46.1)

.478

Q6 56.40(SD=40.5)

71.60(SD=50.5)

.412

Figure 5: Mean Search Times for ExperimentalQuestions by Group

2.2

1.8 1.81.8 1.81.6

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

Q1 Q2 Q3

static alternating

Figure 6. Attitude Survey Question Means

Figure 7: Example Scanpath over an Image

4 Discussion

In this study, an advertisement was considered to bemore effective than another if it was more successful atcapturing user attention, as exhibited by more fixationson the advertisement body, if it increased recognitionmemory for the ad’s content, and if it increased positiveattitudes toward the ad by participants. The results of thestudy did not provide support for the increasedeffectiveness of the alternating banner advertisement ascompared to the static banner advertisement. Thealternating banner advertisements were not significantlymore effective at capturing user attention while theywere engaged in a task than the static banneradvertisements. As has been shown by previousresearch, the appearance of a new perceptual object ishighly likely to capture the observer’s attention [Yantis& Hillstrom, 1994]. However, the abrupt onset of thesecond ad image in the alternating banner condition didnot appear to be effective at capturing user attention inthe current experiment.

The results of the study indicate that participants’fixations on the advertisements did not promoterecognition memory for the banner advertisementspresented during the experiment. Both groups performedpoorly on the recognition task, with the alternatingbanner group exhibiting performance closer to chancethan the static banner group. This result is contrary tothe hypothesis that members of the alternating bannergroup would exhibit better recognition memory for theadvertisements than members of static banner group.Though the mean number of fixations performed on theadvertisements did not differ significantly between thegroups, members of the alternating group did make moretotal fixations on the banner advertisements than thestatic banner group. Therefore, it is highly unusual thatmembers of the static banner group would exhibit better

recognition memory for the advertisements given theirlower number of total fixations. (Note: It is worth tonote that, although not included in data analysis, bothgroups performed poorly on a measure of recall memorythat was administered before the recognition task.)

The alternating banner advertisements were notsufficiently distracting so as to slow down the membersof the alternating banner group in completing theexperimental questions. Members in the static bannergroup and the alternating banner group both seemed tocomplete the questions in a timely manner. This findingmay indicate that participants’ attention was directedtoward the experimental task itself, and that both typesof advertisements were unsuccessful in capturing userattention.

Finally, contrary to the hypothesis, both groupsexhibited a neutral attitude toward the banneradvertisements present during the experiment. Neitherthe static banner group of the alternating banner groupfound the advertisements to be bothersome ordistracting. Some participants even indicated a slightlypositive attitude toward the advertisements. This findingis surprising, given that Internet advertising in general isoften viewed as intrusive and bothersome. Participantsmay have felt more positively about the banneradvertisements since they were engaged in a task andtheir attention was directed toward searching for theanswers to the experimental questions. If thisexperiment were repeated without having theparticipants engaged in a task, participants may judgethe advertisements as more bothersome.

While the study does not provide support for theeffectiveness of the alternating banner advertisementover the static banner advertisement, it does providesupport for the idea of “banner blindness.” Overall, themeasures in the study provide support for the idea thatusers pay little attention to banners and can rememberlittle about their content. Participants did make fixationson the banners, but they exhibited poor memory for thecontent of the advertisements as their attention wasdirected toward the experimental task. Similar behaviorcan be expected from Internet users, as most have aspecific goal in mind as they browse the Web.

Further research on the topic of Internet advertisingshould investigate other forms of advertising that havebecome increasingly popular, such as pop-up advertisingor Flash advertising. The collection of eye tracking datais encouraged when pursuing these topics, since as itprovides a valuable measure of user attention. Furtherresearch may also want to investigate user attention toInternet advertising as they freely browse the Internet,while not engaged in an experimental task.

On the Internet a user’s attention is a valuable asset foradvertisers. Ad designers must be aware of which typesof advertisements are most effective at capturing userattention in a medium where they are bombarded withinformation from countless sources. While fighting for

the user’s attention, advertisements must also beunobtrusive enough to not cause users to develop anegative attitude toward the ad and, in turn, to theproduct being advertised. Neither an alternating banneradvertisement or a static banner advertisement appearsto be effective in achieving this delicate balance.

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