Stupid Homer
People are curious about getting smarter by learning things, but is there any chance to become stupid by “learning” or “seeing” the wrong things?
As we know people can be influenced by certain keywords. In an experiment people have seen words that are linked to age, words like: walking-stick, retirement, grey etc. After this experiment the group that has seen these words have walked significantly slower than the control-goup that has not seen those words. Hence, we get influenced by those stimuli. That’s called a priming-effect.
But is there any chance to get less intelligent by hearing words that are connected to stupidity? Yes, at least for a while according to a study conducted by Markus Appel.
So why is this valuable for marketing? If you are aware of those priming-effects you can use them for your marketing communications as this not only works with the IQ, it also works with other temporary conditions like attitudes or behavior. Financial service providers are already using those effects to influence their clients to invest more money with positive money related wordings. So, the question is, how could you use the effect for your own business?
