According to the study, physical media left a “deeper footprint” in the brain, even after for controlling for the increase in sensory processing for tangible items:

• Material shown on cards generated more activity within the area of the brain associated with the integration of visual and spatial information (the left and right parietal).
• This suggests that physical material is more “real” to the brain. It has a meaning, and a place. It is better connected to memory because it engages with its spatial memory networks. [From Millward Brown Case Study - Using Neuroscience to Understand the Role of Direct Mail.]

The study also found that the tangible materials involved more emotional processing in the subjects, important from a branding and ad recall standpoint:

• More processing is taking place in the right retrosplenial cortex when physical material is presented. This is involved in the processing of emotionally powerful stimuli and memory, which would suggest that the physical presentation may be generating more emotionally vivid memories.
• Physical activity generates increased activity in the cerebellum, which is associated with spatial and emotional processing (as well as motor activity) and is likely to be further evidence of enhanced emotional processing.

I’m happy to see that high-tech brain scans show that paper still has some advantages that digital can’t match. The Millward Brown study didn’t get into how to optimize a print piece, but here are a few quick ideas:
– Think about the tactile nature of the piece. Heavier stock and a textured finish could emphasize the “tangibility” of the mailed item.
– Take advantage of the brain’s emotional engagement with tangible media and craft a message that has an emotional impact.
– Build in your brand imagery, since brand recall may be enhanced by the paper medium.

Each of the primary colours; black, cyan (blue), magenta (red), and yellow has a separate plate. Even though you see many colours in the finished printed product, only these four colours are used.

Ink is then distributed onto the plates through a series of rollers. On the press, the plates are dampened, first by water rollers, then ink rollers. The rollers distribute the ink from the ink fountain onto the plates.

The plate picks up ink from the ink rollers and the water rollers keep the ink off of the non-image areas of the plate. Each plate then transfers its image to a rubber blanket that in turn transfers the image to the paper. The plate itself does not actually touch the paper, thus the term “offset” lithography.

The paper is fed through the press as one continuous stream pulled from rolls of paper. One roll can weigh as much as 1 ton and the paper is cut to size after printing. Offset lithography can also be done with pre-cut paper in sheet-fed presses and web presses print at very high speeds and use very large sheets of paper.

The paper is left slightly wet by all of the ink and water and smudging is avoided by having the paper pass through an oven. The paper is then run through a short series of large metal rollers that have refrigerated water flowing through them. These chill rollers instantly and set the ink into the paper.

The bindery is where the printed product is completed. The huge rolls of printed paper are cut and put together so that the pages fall in the correct order.

At this stage if required pages are bound together, by staples or glue and a machine called a stitcher takes the folded printed paper and collates them together with the staples.

The final components in the stitcher machine are the knives, which trim the paper to the final delivered size. The product is then completed and  ready to be shipped.