h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

A1076834

This is a very interesting article - well worth a read.

I've posted my comments at the bottom of the article.

Yes, I agree, very interesting. One of the impressions I got (perhaps mistakenly) was that you feel that the thing we do with the putting our fingers in our ears actually works. That we are less swayed by ads that the advertisers would like us to be? To be honest, I don't think that's true. I'd love to be able to claim that ads don't work on me, but a short sharp shock was in store from me when I moved to a country where many of the brand names of everyday products were unfamiliar to me. It was horrifying how much this confused me, and made me unsure about what I was buying even when, lengthy investigation has proved, that the products are much of a muchness (or are infact the same thing, repackaged).

So I'd like to say that cutting the space for ads would have no immediate effect on consumers as you suggest, but somehow I doubt it. I do agree that it is to a certain extent background noise and that to get us to conciously take note the ads are colonising more and more space - my personal line was crossed when I realised boxers and the like are selling their skin for felt-tipped ads - but the background noise is quite effective too, I suspect. Probably more cos we don't conciously notice it any more, so don't conciously resist it.

Deary me. Mind control conspiricy theories, anyone?

I think that putting one's fingers in one's ears has some effect but is not completely effective.

Mind control seems to strong a term to use, and I think that is because we don't (at least I don't) really have a good way of thinking about influences that are neither insignificant nor totally compelling.

If an advert can just tip us over the edge from choosing Bold to choosing Daz, then that seems to be inconsistent with the idea that we make free rational choices.

I believe that we can make free rational choices if we want to, and if we have the necessary information, but that most purchasing decisions aren't made that way, for reasons of lack of information, or simply because they are not worth the effort. So most purchasing decisions are subconscious or 'autopilot'. The babble of advertising is primarily aimed at the autopilot, not at our conscious selves.

This is corroborated when we consider that the advertising of motor cars, where decisions are worth the effort of conscious consideration, does place more emphasis on product features - actual information - than "this car goes faster and is less bumpy than ever before" which would be the equivalent of the soap powder strategy.