A study tested the relationships between emotion in political television commercials, viewer memory, and evaluations of those advertisements. Subjects were in two groups, one of 31 undergraduates and one of 30 adults from the local community. Subjects in the first group were shown 34 different political ads followed by 28 30-second advertisements. Subjects in the second group were shown a videotape, given instructions and practice sessions, and asked to fill out a questionnaire before being shown a second videotape containing pictures and sound bites from the ads. Recognition of visual and audio information in 28 Bush-Dukakis commercials was generally quicker and more accurate for negative messages than for positive ads, or for ads that combined positive and negative information. There were three categories of messages: ads negative throughout, ads positive throughout, and ads that began negative and finished positive. In the case of negative and positive ads, ratings steadily increased during the first 20 seconds, peaked, and then declined for the remaining 10 seconds. Ratings for negative-positive ads began negative and ended positive, but never achieved the intensity of the other two categories. "Liking" during the last 10 seconds was negatively related to recognition memory for material in the commercials. (Three figures and two tables of data are included; 49 references are attached, as well as an appendix listing political ads used as stimulus material.) (KEH)