Looking back at the 16th ICORIA in Ghent
At the start of the summer, the majority of the advertising research community gathered in Belgium to enjoy this year’s ICORIA conference. More than 160 participants from about 30 countries participated in 33 sessions. The conference took place in the historical scenery of Ghent, where the conference chairs Veroline Cauberghe and Liselot Hudders, and their organizing team, Emma Beuckels, Marijke De Veirman, Laura Herrewijn and Dieneke Van de Sompel gave the participants a taste of the authentic city, its fine cuisine, nice weather (at least in Belgian terms) and provided a warm atmosphere.
Before the official start of the conference, 20 doctoral candidates gathered for the doctoral colloquium and joined a series of interactive workshops, lectures and networking opportunities organized by Guda van Noort (Amsterdam University). Students were presented with sessions on managing their PhD supervisor given by Hilde Voorveld (University of Amsterdam), got tips on possible strategies for research collaborations, career planning and career advice from Jisu Huh (University of Minnesota) and Sandra Diehl (University of Klagenfurt) and joined a panel discussion in which Patrick De Pelsmacker (University of Antwerp), Jisu Huh (University of Minnesota) and Martin Eisend (European University Viadrina) presented issues regarding the future of advertising. During the conference, the colloquium participants also took on the responsibility to serve as a session chair in one of the conference tracks and did a splendid job!
The conference officially started off with a welcome reception at the Faculty of Communication Sciences of Ghent University – which was held in a sunny and musical atmosphere in the authentic buildings of Ghent University. Before the start of the parallel sessions, Prof. dr. Michelle R. Nelson (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) kicked-off the presentations and gave a thought-provoking keynote address on “New Forms of Content: Research and Responsibility”. Both conference days included a wealth of stimulating and interesting papers and sessions on a diverse range of advertising topics, such as digital strategies, creative advertising, advertising regulations, branding, etc.
Some researchers were also lauded for their outstanding work. Awards for the best conference paper went to Jiska Eelen, Peren Ozturan and Peeter W. J. Verlegh for their paper entitled “The Differential Impact of Brand Loyalty on Traditional and Online Word of Mouth”. The award for the best student paper was handed out to Caroline De Bondt, Anneleen Van Kerckhove and Maggie Geuens with their paper “‘Look at That Body!’ How Anthropomorphic Package Shapes Systematically Appeal to Consumers”. Charles Ray Taylor has been awarded with the Flemming Hansen Award for his long term impact in the field of advertising research.
Apart from the interesting research insights that were to be gathered at the conference, participants were also able to enjoy a pleasant social program, which was made possible both online (given the particularly active Twitter, Instagram and Facebook accounts) as offline, as participants were also treated with a boat trip, a conference diner and tasteful lunches and coffee breaks.
Definitely take a look at the photo gallery to relive the wonderful moments at the ICORIA 2017. The conference chairs from Ghent University would like to congratulate and thank all contributing authors with the nice work they have presented at the conference. Additionally, they want to express their gratitude to all reviewers, jury members, sessions’ chairs, the EAA Executive Board, and all the sponsors for their valued contribution. After three days filled with inspiring keynotes, talks and meeting opportunities, participants hopefully went home with good memories, a lot of stimulating new insights and some simple, yet significant ideas, such as the fact that one should write like it matters … and it will!
