Spectral Brand Theory: A Computational Framework for Multi-Dimensional Brand Perception

Brand measurement collapses multi-dimensional perception into single scores, destroying the information that explains why different observers form irreconcilable perceptions of the same brand. Prior dimensional approaches decompose brand meaning into attribute-level dimensions but treat those dimensions as properties of the brand rather than perceptual channels through which heterogeneous observers filter signals. This paper develops Spectral Brand Theory (SBT), arguing that brand perception is irreducibly observer-dependent. The framework decomposes brand signals across eight perceptual dimensions, defines observer cohorts through formal spectral profiles, and models perception as probabilistic cloud…