Brand placements in video games: how local in-game experiences influence brand attitudes
Moritz Ingendahl, Tobias Vogel, Alexander Maedche and Michaela Wänke start from the finding that brand placements are common in video games but that their overall effect on brand attitudes is small and differs between studies. Taking an evaluative conditioning view, they ran two experiments in one 3D first-person game and found that only brands met during positive in-game experiences gained from the placement, while brands paired with negative experiences did not. Attitudes depended largely on memory for which brand went with which experience, and the conditioning effect grew when players attended to the pairing, for example when it mattered to the game's storyline. The authors conclude that evaluative conditioning and its cognitive mechanisms can explain and predict advertising effects in applied settings such as brand placements in games. The abstract gives no sample sizes.
Moritz Ingendahl, Tobias Vogel, Alexander Maedche and Michaela Wänke start from the finding that brand placements are common in video games but that their overall effect on brand attitudes is small and differs between studies. Taking an evaluative conditioning view, they ran two experiments in one 3D first-person game and found that only brands met during positive in-game experiences gained from the placement, while brands paired with negative experiences did not. Attitudes depended largely on memory for which brand went with which experience, and the conditioning effect grew when players attended to the pairing, for example when it mattered to the game's storyline. The authors conclude that evaluative conditioning and its cognitive mechanisms can explain and predict advertising effects in applied settings such as brand placements in games. The abstract gives no sample sizes.
Written from the openAlex abstract record read 2026-10-22.
What our sources record
Recorded when this source was checked, figures included, with page references and quotation marks removed.
Ingendahl, M., Vogel, T., Maedche, A., & Wänke, M. (2023). Brand placements in video games: how local in-game experiences influence brand attitudes. Psychology & Marketing, 40(2), 274-287. doi:10.1002/mar.21770