Watershed Brain Regions for Characterizing Brand Equity-Related Mental Processes

Brand equity is an important intangible for enterprises. As one advantage, products with brand equity can increase revenue, compared with those without such equity. However, unlike tangibles, it is difficult for enterprises to manage brand equity because it exists within consumers’ minds. Although, over the past two decades, numerous consumer neuroscience studies have revealed the brain regions related to brand equity, the identification of unique brain regions related to such equity is still controversial. Therefore, this study identifies the unique brain regions related to brand equity and assesses the mental processes derived from these regions. For this purpose, three analysis methods (i.e., the quantitative meta-analysis, chi-square tests, and machine learning) were conducted. The data were collected in accordance with the general procedures of a qualitative meta-analysis. In total, 65 studies (1412 foci) investigating branded objects with brand equity and unbranded objects without brand equity were examined, whereas the neural systems involved for these two brain regions were contrasted. According to the results, the parahippocampal gyrus and the lingual gyrus were unique brand equity-related brain regions, whereas automatic mental processes based on emotional associative memories derived from these regions were characteristic mental processes that discriminate branded from unbranded objects.