The impact of social setting on the recall and recognition of in-game advertising

The current paper contributes to the study of in-game advertising (IGA) effectiveness by investigating the impact of social setting on brand awareness (i.e. brand recall and recognition) in a digital game context. An experiment (N = 121) was conducted in which participants played a digital game containing IGA in various social conditions. Results show that a person's social environment has a significant influence on brand awareness and that this effect can be primarily attributed to two factors: social presence (i.e. the awareness of and interaction with another person) and player interactivity (i.e. the ability to actively control a digital game). Playing in a social setting seems to have a negative influence on the recall and recognition of IGA, with other people serving as a distracting factor. Watching while others play a digital game, however, has a positive impact on brand awareness