From attention to emotion: neuroscientific approaches in tourism advertising – a systematic review

Purpose This study systematically examines the application of neuroscientific approaches in tourism advertising, offering a comprehensive and integrative assessment of how these approaches can be used to understand consumer responses. Design/methodology/approach A systematic literature review was conducted on peer-reviewed studies in English, including journal articles, book chapters, reviews, and conference papers published between 2012 and 2025 at Scopus database. Studies from disciplines outside the core focus of tourism advertising (e.g. physics, engineering, medicine, agriculture, mathematics and biochemistry) were excluded to ensure conceptual relevance. The search process led to 37 articles being examined. The conduct of the review process drew upon predefined inclusion and exclusion criteria, and each study was evaluated for a) methodological rigor and b) for its deployment of the neuroscientific approach in accordance with the SPAR-4-SLR protocol. This structured approach helped to ensure a holistic presentation of theoretical trends, methodological patterns, and research gaps in the field. Findings The review reveals a growing reliance amongst tourism advertising researchers on neuroscientific techniques such as eye-tracking, electroencephalography (EEG), electrodermal activity and facial expression analysis. Such methods have been primarily deployed to examine attention, cognitive processing, and emotional responses toward visual and narrative advertising stimuli and their effects on consumer perceptions and behavioral intentions. However, the literature remains theoretically fragmented, with many neuroscientific studies adopting an exploratory approach that lacks explicit and/or coherent theoretical grounding. Originality/value This study exposes theoretical fragmentation in this field and advances a holistic conceptual framework to explain behavioral outcomes by integrating neuroscientific indicators with cognitive and emotional mechanisms. The framework provides a structured foundation for future theory-driven research and offers actionable insights for the strategic design of more effective tourism advertising.