It’s Written on Your Face: How Emotional Variation in Super Bowl Advertisements Influences Ad Liking

While prior work has examined the effects of emotions on consumers’ attitudes toward ads, little research has explored how the joint presence of positive and negative emotions affects ad-related outcomes and to what extent such ads are common. This research leverages recent advances in emotion recognition technology to identify emotions based on the facial expressions of actors in Super Bowl ads aired over the past five years. We examine how the joint presence of happiness—a basic positive emotion—and sadness, disgust, anger, and fear—basic negative emotions—in these ads predict USA TODAY Ad Meter scores (the premier tracker of public opinion on Super Bowl ads). Results show that the joint presence of happiness and sadness enhances ad liking, the presence of happiness and fear reduces ad liking, while the presence of happiness and anger or happiness and disgust do not affect ad liking. We discuss the theoretical and methodological implications of these findings and future research directions.