This study examined the effect of programme context on the memory for humorous television advertisements among a young male Japanese sample (N--136) aged 16 to 17 years. Participants were given free and cued recall tests. The relationship between the involvement and enjoyment properties of the programme and memory for the advertisements was investigated for a set of six humorous and non-humorous advertisements embedded within two programme contexts - a mid-day news and a light entertainment show. The two sets of advertisements were for matching products, and were selected from a sample of 40 advertisements. Findings indicate that free recall for advertisements was affected by programme type with memory for advertisements was better from light entertainment show than from the news. Additionally, memory for humorous advertisements was better than that for non-humorous advertisements. There were no significant interactions showing no advantage for memory for humorous advertisements in non-humorous programmes and vice-versa.

Key words: television advertisements, memory, context effects