An Eye-Tracking Study of Attention Capture Efficiency in Commercial Poster Design

The design of commercial posters must effectively capture consumer attention. To scientifically evaluate the impact of different design formats on attention-grabbing efficiency, three advertising posters were selected. Corresponding dynamic and static, as well as colour and black-and-white (B&W), versions were generated. Sixty participants were recruited for an eye-tracking experiment, recording key metrics such as fixation duration and fixation count. Results indicate: (1) Dynamic posters significantly outperformed static posters for both total fixation duration and total fixation count. When observing the total fixation duration, F = 245.896, p < 0.001, confirming the distinct advantage of dynamic design for capturing attention. (2) Colour posters generally attracted and sustained visual attention more effectively than did B&W posters. When observing the total fixation duration, F = 5.067, p = 0.028 < 0.05. (3) The impact of dynamic effects on attention is more pronounced than that of colour. For both static and dynamic posters, colour and B&W designs show no significant difference in their effect on attention, p = 0.330 > 0.05, η2 = 0.018. This provides a context-dependent prioritisation framework for commercial poster design decisions grounded in visual cognitive science.