Active White Space (AWS) in Logo Designs: Effects on Logo Evaluations and Brand Communication

Abstract

In this article, we explore Active White Space (AWS)—the space between individual logo design elements—as a stylistic modification that revamps a logo design yet preserves its extant associations. Across three studies, we find AWS to be an effective stylistic logo tool. In Study 1, we find that adding AWS to pictorial logos improves their visual evaluation. In Study 2, we find this positive evaluation to spillover to verbal brand aspects such that logo designs with AWS are perceived to communicate brand descriptions more clearly. In Study 3, we find that logo designs with AWS benefit sophisticated brand personalities the most, followed by sincere, exciting, and competent brand personalities, with no effect on rugged brand personalities.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the following reviewers for their contributions: We thank Reviewer 1 for helping us clarify our focus on perceptual fluency as being affected by the incorporation of AWS in logo designs. We thank Reviewers 2 and 3 for helping us simplify the theoretical aspects of interaction between AWS and brand personality types. We thank Reviewer 3 for helping to clarify that AWS itself is a manipulation of perceptual fluency. We also thank Reviewer 3 for pointing out our study limitations.