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The Value of Subliminal Advertising to the Modern Marketer

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The Value of Subliminal Advertising to the Modern Marketer Western Michigan University ScholarWorks at WMU Honors Theses Lee Honors College 2-21-1983 The Value of Subliminal Advertising to the Modern Marketer Bruce Peckover Western Michigan University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/honors_theses Part of the Advertising and Promotion Management Commons, and the Marketing Commons Recommended Citation Peckover, Bruce, "The Value of Subliminal Advertising to the Modern Marketer" (1983). Honors Theses. 397. https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/honors_theses/397 This Honors Thesis-Open Access is brought to you for free and open access by the Lee Honors College at ScholarWorks at WMU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Honors Theses by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks at WMU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Value of Subliminal Advertising to the Modern Marketer Prepared by Bruce Peckover W.M.U. Honors College Senior Paper February 21, 1983 Introduction This honors paper provides an evaluation of the arguments and evidence advanced supporting and denying the effectiveness of various subliminal techniques used in advertising. These practices supposedly influence consumer behavior by subconsciously altering attitudes or preferences toward products. While researchers offer some marginal evidence of subliminal stimuli influencing like/dislike reactions, the marketing relevance of the evidence remains to be documented. This investigation examines the history, the use, the legality, and the value of subliminal advertising to the marketer. A thorough discussion of each of these points is made with references to documented sources. The intent of this paper is not to deny the existence of motives of which one may be unaware. The thesis is simply that subliminal directives have not been shown to have the power ascribed to them by subliminal advertis ing advocates. 2 An understanding of the history and boundaries of subliminal advertising is necessary before arguments for or against it can effectively be explored. Equally im portant is an analysis of the possibility of using sub- liminal advertising to manipulate the consumer. If this technique is used, the likelihood of using it success fully must be explored too. A Definition of Subliminal Perception Subliminal means below the threshold of conscious ness. Anything perceived below the threshold of con- scious awareness is subliminal perception. Subliminal perception refers to our ability to perceive and respond to stimuli that are just below the limen, or threshold of consciousness. The concept of a sensory limen or threshold is technically complex. Normally, it is that level of stimulus in tensity at which a subject, over a number of trials, reports being conscious of the stimulus one-half of the time. What is well above the stimulus threshold for one person will be slightly below the stimulus threshold for a second, and far below the stimulus threshold for a third. Subliminal perception is the level of stimulus in tensity at which a test subject professes unawareness of the existence of stimuli, yet at which we can demonstrate a behavioral response to the stimulus in question. Since sample contamination is diffucult to control because the stimulus threshold varies from one test subject to an other, if subliminal manipulation is used, the effective ness of it is highly questionable. When studies make little or no effort to determine a threshold for indi vidual subjects, they are at risk because the stimuli may be supraliminal (above threshold of consciousness) for some subjects in some trials. The results may then be due to the effects of weak (but not subliminal) stim ulation. The Start of the Subliminal Controversy In New Jersey some unwitting theater audiences were invited to drink Coca-Cola and eat popcorn in brief superimposed messages on the movie in progress during September of 1957. Viewers were consciously unaware of any message transmitted to them because exposure times of the message were very short. Research executive James Vicary used a tachistoscope, an extremely fast shutter device, to flash the messages lasting only l/3000th of a second on a movie screen every five seconds According to Vicary, this process increased popcorn sales by 57% and Coke sales by 18%. With these findings, the popular press sounded the alarm of the real possibility of influencing the consumer without his awareness: ...take this invention and everything connected with it and attach it to the center of the next nuclear explosive sched uled for testing.^ ...the most alarming and outrageous discovery since Mr. Gatling invented his gun. 3 Immediately critics questioned the ethics of psy chologically manipulating innocent and unknowing consum ers. According to the New Yorker, minds had been "broken into and entered." The furor resulted in an increased interest in Vicary's subliminal study by the scientific community. Vicary's findings are notable for several reasons: 1) The exposure rate of l/3000th of a second is far briefer than any previously reported stimulation. 2) There were no reports of even the most rudi mentary scientific controls that would lend credibility to the study. 3) Those who supposedly conducted the test - a firm, incidentally, that sold subliminal projectors - in a demonstration set up for the press, had "technical difficulties" that permitted viewers to be aware they were stimulated. 4) Further attempts to gather specific in formation on the details of the study were ignored. Not only does Vicary's entire report appear to have all the characteristics of fabrication, the proponents of subliminal advertising basing their arguments on his study have no basis from which to argue. Whether Vicary's study was a hoax or not was never proven; but under con trol led, supervised conditions, he was not able Lo duplicate his results. Vicary soon disappeared from the scene. The History of Subliminal Advertising Only a few attempts at subliminal manipulation have been recorded according to the American Association of Advertising Agencies representative, Charles F. Adams. He made this clear in his testimony before the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms in reference to their pro posed regulations for the advertising of alcoholic bev erages, with specific reference to subliminal advertising According to Adams only a few attempts at subliminal manipulation have been recorded: 1) A television station in Los Angeles experimented with subliminal messages by flashing "Drive Safely" on the screen during news shows. The accident rate in Los Angeles continued without any noticeable let up. And in Witchita, Kansas, a local television station attempted to con vince, with subliminal messages, a killer who was at large that he should give himself up. The campaign was not successful. 2) In England, a BBC science panel show flashed a subliminal four woro news item during a show and asked viewers to identify it. Of 430 re plies, 150 claimed to have perceived it, but only 20 got it right. 6 3) A motion picture producer proudly proclaimed he was using subliminal projection in his movie "My World Dies Screaming", flashing the word "Blood" on the screen to heighten emotion. The film was little noted nor long remembered. 4) A Seattle radio station began broadcasting "sub- audible" messages such as "TV's a bore". The station's ratings did not show a marked improve ment and local TV ratings remained constant. 5) The Premium Corporation of America inserted the subliminal words "Get it" in a television com mercial for the game Husker-Du. The company claimed the words were inserted by an exuberant (but misguided) young man from a production house in Minneapolis. The commercial was re moved from the air and history records the marketplace was not kind to Husker-Du.° Most of the existing fear of subliminal advertising is due to Wilson Key's book Subliminal Seduction. The University of Western Ontario professor's book became voguish and is required reading in many college courses in psychology and marketing. Subliminal Seduction and Key's next book Media Sexploitation created concern about mind manipulation. The books also inspired considerable paranoia about subliminal advertising. Key sees sex in everything. A wine bottle is a phallic symbol. A glass of ice turns into a sexual fan tasy. He claims a Howard Johnson restaurant placemat has human bodies engaged in a wanton sex orgy on it. An ice cube in a liquor ad reveals the letters S-E-X in the shadows, an incredible photographic achievement since a professional examination of the original photograph and the engraving plates revealed no retouching. Key's arguments will be examined in depth later. His books were mentioned here only because of the fear and suspicion they aroused in consumer's minds about marketing practices. Types of Subliminal Stimulation Briefly presented visual stimuli are the first of three identifiable means of subliminal stimulation. Messages are flashed so quickly, usually with a tachis- toscope, the viewer is unaware of their presense. Visual stimulation purportedly registers subconsciously and allegedly affects subsequent behavior. Behavior control is also attempted by using low volume auditory messages and accelerated speech. While the message may be unintelligible and unnoticed at a conscious level, the claim is that these messages are never-the-less processed subconsciously and they then influence behavior. Another procedure consists of embedding or hiding sexual imagery or words in advertising pictures. These images supposedly are concealed so that they are not apparent to conscious observation. Allegedly the images have a subconscious effect on behavior. 8 Documented Studies Given its covert nature and the ethical considerations involved, the prevalence of subliminal advertising is very likely under estimated by reliance upon published reports. At any rate, such techniques are believed to be widespread by a great many people who can hardly be faulted for vigorously protesting against their use. John Q. Public has his hands full trying to cope with forms of ex ploitation of which he is fully aware.
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