Key considerations for Cognitive Ease

About the Cognitive Ease Score

The cognitive ease score aims to answer one question; How easy is it to visually process the ad?

Cognitive ease is, in simple terms, a measure of how 'difficult' your ad is to visually process. It refers to how the strength and number of visual attention areas affect visual complexity. 

When there are many competing areas drawing visual attention, this reduces the ease of processing. Also, when there are abrupt scene changes, cognitive ease is decreased. Take a look at this quick video on Cognitive Ease from our Scientific Director, Ingrid Nieuwenhuis:

A good video ad can guide attention in a split second, to enable the processing of the information under fast viewing conditions. Take a look at the image below as an example - the ad on the left is simple and clear with one point of attention - this is great in terms of cognitive ease and makes it easily digestible for the viewer. However, the example on the right has a lot of different points of attention, or visual clutter, making the viewer feel overwhelmed and harder to remember the key message.

How can you improve cognitive ease?

So, to improve your cognitive ease score remember the following:

• Avoid having too many separate focal points (visual clutter) in your ad
• Don't use split-screen or too many abrupt scene changes

For a more detailed explanation on how to improve your cognitive ease score, take a look at this video from Ingrid Nieuwenhuis: