This document summarizes research on how the amount of interstitial space in logos impacts brand attitudes differently in tight versus loose cultures. Five studies found that compact logos with little empty space were preferred over spacious logos in tight cultures, because empty space signals vulnerability. However, in loose cultures the pattern was reversed, with spacious logos preferred. The effect was mediated by perceptions of brand reliability. A field experiment replicated the findings using an online advertising campaign. The research contributes to understanding the relationship between visual design, culture, and cognition.

1. Tight Cultures Prefer Tight Logos: Semiotics of
Space Differs across Cultures
Dr Tanvi Gupta
Indian Institute of
Management Udaipur
Festival of NewMR April 2021

2. Sponsors
Communication

3. Safe Together, Vulnerable Apart:
How Interstitial Space in Text Logos Impacts Brand
Attitudes in Tight versus Loose Cultures
Tanvi Gupta
Henrik Hagtvedt
Forthcoming at Journal of Consumer Research (JCR)
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4. Logos are carriers of brand meaning
• Logos are the most salient elements of a brand’s visual
identity (Walsh, Page Winterich, & Mittal, 2010)
• Companies spend millions of dollars to arrive at the
right design for their logo (Davies & Paterson, 2000).
• One of the goals of visual branding is to establish and
enhance specific brand associations.
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5. Design features that cue brand reliability
Boundaries
(Cutright 2011;
Fajardo, et al. 2016)
Unambiguous typeface
(Hagtvedt 2011)
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Stable centre of gravity
(Rahinel & Nelson 2016)
Signaling brand reliability is an important goal of visual branding.
Compact vs. Spacious
(This paper)

6. A primal discomfort with empty
space based on Aristotle's idea that
"nature abhors an empty space."
Fear of empty spaces
Primitive societies
Mortelmans (2005)
Worship of empty spaces
Civilized societies (higher classes)
Empty space serves as a mark of
distinction and good taste – created
through the civilization process
HORROR VACUI AMOR VACUI
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Consumer response to visual space

7. White space in advertising
= prestige, ease of processing
(Pieters, et al. 2007, 2010; Pracejus, et al. 2006, 2013)
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AMOR VACUI
IN ADVERTISING

8. Interstitial space in product
displays = aesthetic appeal, and
prestige (Sevilla and Townsend 2016)
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AMOR VACUI
IN RETAIL STORES

9. 9
But what about space within logos?

10. 10
Functions of Space
Space as Capital
Space as Emptiness
Signals prestige (Pracejus, et al. 2006, 2013; Sevilla & Townsend 2016)
Ease of processing (Pieters, et al. 2007, 2010)
AMOR VACUI
in advertising and retail
Space as Separation HORROR VACUI
in logos
Signals vulnerability (This paper)

11. Design elements as abstractions of physical experiences
Perceptual forces are counterpart of physical forces (Gestalt theory: Arnheim 1974)
Visual characteristics of design elements can inform judgments in ways consistent with physical laws.
Shape
People prefer visual designs of
a curved (rather than angular)
nature, since sharp contours in
physical objects convey a
sense of threat
(Bar and Neta 2006, 2007)
Products with a product image
lower (vs. higher) on the package
facade were estimated to be
heavier in weight because gravity
pulls heavy objects to the ground
(Deng and Kahn 2009).
Spatial arrangement
In everyday life, people use metaphors
that tap into concrete physical
experiences to describe their abstract
psychological experiences.
(Lakoff & Johnson 1980)
Conceptual Metaphor Theory

12. Powerful brands – Logo High (Sundar and
Noseworthy 2014)
Antique vs Modern
English vs Hebrew
(Chae and Hoegg 2013)
Verticality = Power Left/Right = Past/ Future
(Jiang, et al. 2015)
Angular/Circular Shape
= Durability/Comfort
Some more examples of visual metaphors

13. Proximity is strength (separation is vulnerability)
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Interstitial Space as Separation

14. Cultural Tightness – Looseness (TL): A Social Adaptation to Threats
• Tight (loose) cultures have many (few) strongly enforced social
norms and little (much) tolerance for deviance (Gelfand et al. 2011)
• Cultural tightness has evolved as a social adaptation to
chronic ecological and territorial threats, contributing to
chronic states of high perceived risk and need for structure
through tight social-systems.
• TL at different levels, e.g., state(Harrington and Gelfand 2014), industry(Lin et
al. 2017), organization(Aktas et al. 2016), individual(Gelfand et al. 2011)
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Social tightness ßà Visual tightness

15. Conceptual Framework
Interstitial space
in logos
Product
safety
Brand
attitude
Cultural tightness – looseness
(Operationalized via geographical region,
organizational culture, or individual trait)
Note: Tested with five studies, including an archival dataset analysis, three experiments, and a field study
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16. Study 1:
Compact vs. Spacious Brand Logos in the Marketplace
• Dataset with almost 700 top US national brands across 16 product categories, with Young
and Rubicam’s Brand Asset Valuator variables and survey of over 4,700 consumers
(Lovett, Peres, and Shachar 2014)
• We found, downloaded, and coded images of all logos.
Inter-coder reliability was significant (Kappa coefficient = .82).
Variables
• IV: compact vs. intermediate vs. spacious logo
• DV: Brand preference (single measure)
• Mediator: Product safety (reliable, secure, trustworthy; α = .74)
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17. Examples of compact logos from the dataset
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18. Examples of spacious logos from the dataset
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19. Results
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ANOVA: F(2, 551) = 12.33, p < .001
Interstitial space
in logos
Product
safety
Brand
preference
-1.05*** 4.16***
IE= -4.17 (CI95= -6.0673, -2.4423)
***p<.0001
Mediation (PROCESS Model 4):
Spacious logos reduce brand preference, mediated by perceived brand reliability.

20. Study 2: Regional Tightness – Looseness
• 2 (logo: compact vs. spacious) x 2 (culture: tight vs. loose)
between-subjects experiment
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21. Study 3: Individual Tightness – Looseness
• 2 (logo: compact vs. spacious) x
2 (culture: tight vs. loose)
between-subjects experiment
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22. Study 4: Field Experiment - Google Display Campaign
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DV: Click-through-rate (CTR) from 11,584 impressions
Each impression was converted into a binary data point.
2 (logo: compact vs. spacious) x 2 (culture: tight vs. loose) x 2 (ad placement: none vs. safety) between-subjects design
Two versions of a website logo TL manipulated via geographic
targeting of US states
Ad placement manipulated
via topics (e.g., insurance,
fire safety)

23. Results
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24. Study 5: Replicate three-way effect with controlled experiment
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2 (logo: compact vs. spacious) x 2 (culture: tight vs. loose) x 2 (product framing: control vs. safety) between-subjects
design

25. Contribution
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Visual space
Cultural Tightness CultureàAesthetics
Logo design Brand reliability cues
Conceptual metaphor of “Proximity is strength”
Visual branding
Cross-cultural psychology
Cognitive psychology
Digital method for visual aesthetics
Methodological contribution
Design theory

26. Sponsors
Communication

27. Q & A
Dr Tanvi Gupta
Indian Institute of
Management
Udaipur
Sue York
The Research Society