Advertising repetition is frequently used to influence consumers' judgments
of an advertised product. Several studies have found that when the target
ad is repeated in a cluttered environment, repetition may not affect judgme
nts. These findings have provoked little interest because they seem to be a
ttributable to the interference introduced by the cluttered environments. T
he implication is that a substantial number of exposures to the target ad w
ould be needed before an effect of ad repetition on product judgments would
be observed. Based on recent research, this article offers and tests an al
ternative account. The hypothesis is that the nature of the environment in
which an ad is repeated can affect the occurrence of two types of target ad
processing: item-specific and relational. The type(s) of processing the ad
receives, in turn, affects ad recipients' learning and judgments of ad-rel
ated information. (C) 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.