Narratives that Last: Exploring Long-Term Retention of Elements in Storytelling Advertising

Abstract

This thesis explores the long-term retention of elements in storytelling advertising, focusing on how various narrative components—such as characters, plot, settings, brand messages, and brand integrations—are recalled over time. Through a qualitative longitudinal study, participants were exposed to selected advertisements and interviewed immediately after viewing, one week later, and one month later to assess recall dynamics. The findings reveal that messages, particularly explicit ones, exhibit the least memory decay, demonstrating a strong associative power that helps them remain salient in consumers' minds. Brand heritage, especially when integrated deeply into the narrative, also showed significant retention, further emphasizing the importance of storytelling in brand communication. Main characters were consistently recalled due to their central role and emotional connection with viewers, while settings and certain plot elements experienced greater memory decay, particularly when they were less emotionally engaging. The pointed reasons for high levels of retention in certain elements were due to being emotionally impactful, central to the narrative, and associative with the other elements. The findings offer both practical insights for marketers aiming to optimize their narrative strategies and theoretical contributions to the understanding of memory retention in narrative advertising.