The position of static and on-off banners in WWW displays on subsequent recognition

With the growing popularity of the World Wide Web (WWW), more companies are advertisingon the Internet with the intention of influencing purchasing decisions. While companies would like to capture people's attention every time a banner ad appears on a viewer's computer screen, there is some research that suggests that they do not. In Experiment 1, static display of banners at each of the four corners of the screen was investigatedusing a subsequentrecognition test. Experiment 2 examinedmore locationson the screen withon-off banners. The results of both experiments showed that participants better recognized the content of banners positioned on the top left and bottom right corners than the top right and bottom left corners. Experiment 2 showed that participants were more likely to recognize the content of on-off banners that positioned closer to the center of the screen than those at the edges of the screen. Implications for attention capture and distraction are discussed with respect to producing more effective advertisements and communicating priority information are discussed.