The aim of the study was to evaluate the neural correlates of brand perception with a special regard to the brand strength.

20 HS (10 m / 10 f, mean age 27 y) were examined using a 3.0T scanner. Prior to, during and at the end of the examination, subject’s perception of the two different brands was tested by a questionnaire. fMRI was block-designed with 2 active blocks consisting of 8 stimuli each (pictures of a subjective strong and a subjective weak car brand combined with the logo, presentation time 3.0 sec/stimulus). Each picture was underlined of a short question to evaluate the perception of the brand using a four-point scale ranging from “disagree” to “agree strongly”. As control condition, an abstract colored image was displayed. For anatomical reference 3D-T1w images were obtained. Statistical analysis was carried out using BrainVoyager QX™. Neuropsychological data were analyzed by SPSS 13.0.

Significant increase of activation was found bilaterally in the inferior frontal gyrus, anterior insula and the anterior cingulated while presenting the strong brand. A smaller cluster was detected predominantly left-hemispheric in the precuneus. In contrast presentation of the weaker brand showed activations in the precuneus bilaterally. In general the clusters of activations were larger by presenting the weak brand. No significant increase if SI was found using the contrast strong>weak. But we detected decrease of SI in parts of the inferior frontal gyrus and of the anterior cingulated bilaterally as well as occipital. The opposite contrast (weak>strong) on the other hand showed significant activations bilateral in the frontal gyrus and in parts of the anterior cingulate as well as in the occipital lobe bilaterally.

The results may support the hypothesis that the perception of different brand-strengths follows an all-or-non-effect with reduced activations in areas of working memory and increased activation involved in processing of emotions and self-identifying by presenting strong brands.

The key idea of this approach is to employ recent neuroscientific methods in order to analyze economically relevant brain processes.