In two experiments, the authors manipulated the audience's level of involvement in processing an advertisement and whether the advertisement was open-ended (i.e., did not include an explicit conclusion) or closed-ended. Results of both experiments show the open-ended advertisement to be superior to the closed-ended one for an involved audience in terms of brand attitude, purchase intention, and choice, whereas only a small and statistically insignificant difference between the two types of advertisements is found for the uninvolved audience. Moreover, the second experiment shows that the choice advantage of the open-ended ad for the involved audience persisted when measured one week later.
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