#103. Priming

“The world today is full of disguises”, is the effect of the thoughts that any post-pubescent boy or a girl going through a breakup will portray. And no one disagrees with this fact. All of us are trying to portray our best selves to the rest of the world, thanks to the need for approval which is biologically coded into our psychology.

Today, however, I want to pull attention to another form of disguise that we experience in our daily lives. One that rarely presents itself to the naked eye, and only when we sit and deeply understand the intricacies of the human brain. So, let’s take 5 minutes out of our day to understand this hidden, facet of life.

“The primed ideas have some ability to prime other ideas, although more weakly. Like ripples on a pond, activation spreads through a small part of the vast network of associated ideas.”
― Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow

I recently read about the concept of “priming”. Priming is a phenomenon where seemingly insignificant inputs we receive from our environment cause a drastic impact on our responses to situations. For example: people who have seen the word “EAT” in their recent experience are more likely to complete SO_P as SOUP, rather than SOAP.

This experiment might appear impertinent to us, largely because this is not contributing anything to our current experience of our lives. We are merely reading this as observers. But I am certain that for anyone who was a subject would have been taken aback by it, due to the realisation that we can be manipulated by inputs that they did not even register consciously.

Priming has long been a part of the repertoire of genius marketers who have been known to drive meaningful associations in the minds of the unwitting consumers. This concept is largely used by brands across the globe to condition their consumers minds to boost sales, improving brand recall and increase their revenue and bottom lines.

A few examples of priming are: Unwinding being linked to watching Netflix, luxury with tobacco products and success with deodorants. The advertising industry is rife with examples of priming in live action.

Think about this, after a long day at work, all you want to do is sit in front of the television with a nice movie on, ordering a pizza and forgetting about the arduously long working hours.

The question I can almost hear coming a mile away is why am I making such a big fuss about it? I’ll tell you why.

The generation today is more susceptible to being primed than any other generation that has ever existed in the world, all thanks to the technological advances humans have made, especially in the past 30 years. It started with the internet, followed by information age, and now today’s attention economy are not left untouched from the phenomenon of priming.

Social media is one of the biggest sensory drivers that have ever existed, because with it, we are never really disconnected from one another, or anyone looking to drive our behaviours for their own monetary gain. And it is not even rudimentary levels of mere content creation to increase the awareness of brands, but research backed strategies that capture the most attention and drive home the potential connections that brands want to make in our minds.

Tripping yet?

Honestly, I am. I have gone down this rabbit hole once or twice, thinking, are my thoughts even my own? Or am I being manipulated through my life, having experiences through which seemingly irrelevant stimuli are leading me.

The worst part is, there are intended and unintended effects of everything in the world. Priming is not exclusive of this notion. Priming is also exploited as a mask over the potential negative impacts of these connections.

Be it the lead character of the movie going through a breakup abusing alcohol and smoking like the chimney, or sportspersons endorsing your favourite soft drink brand, there are intricate impacts of connecting a brand or a product to a known personality, a belief or a desire in which the masses share an interest.

The sportsperson themselves might not be an avid consumer of the soft drink they are endorsing, given the fact that they have strict fitness regimens that will never include the soft drink. The actor portraying the heartbroken lover might only be simulating the smoking and the drinking.

Intuitively, we all know that alcohol and cigarettes are contributors to numerous diseases and vastly degraded quality of life. Intuitively, we all know that rash vehicles are prone to causing and being involved in accidents. But the portrayals of these acts is such an enticing depiction of the event that the thrill of the act, the momentary adrenaline spike becomes a desirable outcome, and take precedence over the thought process which makes us contemplate the potential negative outcomes, all thanks to the association with the so called people who are “looked up to” by most.

In the end, all I’d like to say is

Be very mindful of the decisions you are making, for they might not necessarily be your own.

If you stuck around this far, thank you for your time. If you enjoyed this, share this with one friend of yours whom you think will benefit from reading this. Thanks for reading, and I will see you in the next one. 🙂