Background: Visual salience computed using algorithmic procedures have been shown to predict eye-movements in a number of contexts. However, despite calls to incorporate computationally-defined visual salience metrics as a means of assessing the effectiveness of advertisements, few studies have incorporated these techniques in a marketing context. The present study sought to determine the impact of visual salience and knowledge of a brand on eye-movement patterns and buying preferences.

Methods: Participants (N=38) were presented with 54 pairs of products presented on the left and right sides of a blank white screen. For each pair, one product was a known North American product, such as Fresca^?, and one was an unknown British product of the same category, such as Irn Bru^?. Participants were asked to select which product they would prefer to buy while their eye movements were recorded. Salience was computed using Itti & Koch’s [2001] computational model of bottom-up salience. Products were defined as highly salient if the majority of the first five predicted fixations were in the region of the product.

Results: Results showed that participants were much more likely to prefer to buy known products, and tentative evidence suggests that participants had longer total dwell times when looking at unknown products. Salience appears to have had little or no effect on preference for a product, nor did it predict total dwell time or time to first fixation. There also appears to be no interaction between knowledge of a product and visual salience on any of the measures analyzed.

Conclusions: The results indicate that product salience may not be a useful predictor of attention under the constraints of the present experiment. Future studies could use a different operational definition of visual salience which might be more predictive of visual attention. Furthermore, a more fine-grained analysis of product familiarity based on survey data may reveal patterns obscured by the definitional constraints of the present study.

Abstract: In a rapidly changing world, there is an increased need to cultivate ophthalmologists who are not only technically capable but also possess the leadership skills required to be at the forefront of change. Ophthalmologists make daily frontline decisions that determine the quality and efficiency of care based on their leadership qualities. However, they also educate, advocate, perform research, run departments and work in practices—all of which require the practice of effective leadership. Although the need for ophthalmic leadership has been recognised, few training programs offer leadership skills as a component of their core curricula, focussing on clinical knowledge with less emphasis on teaching of non-clinical professional competencies. Clinicians who participate in leadership development are more likely to feel empowered to provide patient-centred care, develop a greater self-awareness and confidence to initiate positive change and promote better team alignment. In turn, the ophthalmic profession collectively benefits from effective leadership as organizations are better run, issues are advocated more globally and challenges are address holistically by ophthalmologists who are not merely technically capable surgeons or researchers, but effective communicators and collaborators. In this paper, we explore the role of leadership in the spheres of healthcare and ophthalmology. We discuss the value of leadership across clinical, educational and organisational levels, with specific emphasis on the current state of development and conclude with a series of recommendations to ensure the continued development of effective ophthalmic leaders into the future.