İzmir University of Economics (IUE) Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering faculty member Prof. Dr. Aydın Akan and lecturer Dr. Rıza Sadıkzade investigated the effects of scented packages on consumers when shopping online. The study, which measured people's brain signals with an electroencephalography (EEG) device and their excitement levels with a skin conductance device, found that scented orders increased consumers' pleasure and arousal responses by 90 percent compared to unscented products.
In the research conducted for the first time in Türkiye, the emotional reactions of the products sent by the companies managing the online shopping process, both scented and unscented, on the consumers were also determined.
“SCENTS HAVE A GREAT IMPACT ON COMPANY CHOICES”
Dr. Sadıkzade, drawing attention to the fact that they also supported the results obtained in the study with surveys, said, “When we compared it with the surveys, we saw that our study was 92 percent compatible. We revealed that scents have a great effect on the preference of companies. Therefore, we concluded that the fact that online sales companies send their orders with scents is effective in people's decisions to shop more and prefer companies. We then conducted this experiment with 4 different scents. As a result, it was concluded that companies that choose the most liked scent can become more preferred.”
“WE MEASURED THE REACTIONS OF EEG SIGNALS TO ODOUR”
Prof. Dr. Aydın Akan, who provided information about the project, said that they were able to collect human physiological signals with the EEG system that provides information about brain functions and activities used in the science laboratory. Prof. Dr. Akan said, “We have electrocardiography (ECG) used to diagnose cardiovascular diseases with EEG signals, electromyography (EMG) which is a neurological test that measures the muscle response and electrical activity of the body by stimulating the nerves and muscles, and a system that tracks eye movements. In previous studies, we examined the attention level of individuals or the effects of various environmental factors on attention. In this project, we tried to measure the reactions of consumers who shop online to scented product packaging. While doing this study, we measured the reactions of EEG signals to scent and obtained positive results.”
