The Serial Position Effect

The Serial Position Effect first documented by a German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus may help explain why, all other factors being equal, promo position within a carrier program has an important effect on subsequent response rates.

Ebbinghaus found that people are better at recalling items from the beginning (“primacy effect”) and end (“recency effect”) of a list rather than the middle. Primacy effect is attributed to the fact that the short-term memory is less crowded by additional items and more attention may be dedicated to processing the first item and storing it in the long term memory. Recency effect is explained by the easy retrieval of the last item still from a short-term memory.

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Simulmedia: Lessons Learned from Promo Positioning

How does this relate to display (and video) ads online? Does the first ad seen in the day generate better retention rates?