Subliminal priming and persuasion: Striking while the iron is hot

doi:10.1016/S0022-1031(02)00502-4

Journal of Experimental Social Psychology

Volume 38, Issue 6, November 2002, Pages 556-568

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0022-1031(02)00502-4 Get rights and content

Abstract

Three studies demonstrated that subliminally priming a goal-relevant cognition (thirst in Studies 1 and 2; sadness in Study 3) influenced behavior (in Study 1) and enhanced the persuasiveness of an ad targeting the goal (in Studies 2 and 3) when people were motivated to pursue the goal (when they were thirsty in Studies 1 and 2; when they expected to interact with another person in Study 3). These results suggest that subliminal priming can be used to enhance persuasion, but only when certain conditions are met. Both the priming of goal-relevant cognitions and the motive to pursue the goal were necessary for ads targeting the goal to be more persuasive. The implications of these results for the role of functionality in subliminal priming and for the use and abuse of subliminal priming in persuasion are discussed.

Section snippets

Study 1

To examine whether subliminal priming would affect people’s behavior primarily when they were motivated, we examined whether subliminal thirst-related primes would lead to increased drinking among people who were thirsty. We also measured participants’ explicit ratings of their thirst at three points in the experiment. These ratings were embedded in a larger mood scale in an attempt to prevent the supraliminal priming of thirst for all participants. The first measurement of thirst allowed us to

Study 2

Study 1 demonstrated that thirst-related subliminal primes can affect people’s drinking behavior when they are thirsty. But can such priming be harnessed to affect the persuasiveness of an advertisement? We think so. Given the results of Study 1, in this study we included only thirsty participants. We expect that when thirsty participants receive thirst-related subliminal primes they will be more susceptible to and more persuaded by an advertisement for a thirst-quenching sports beverage than

Study 3

In the current study, we plan to test whether subliminally priming people with a sad face can activate the concept of sadness and whether such priming will enhance the persuasiveness of an ad for a mood-restoring product primarily in situations in which people are motivated to restore their mood. One such situation seems to be when people expect to interact with another person. Research by Erber, Wegner, and Therriault (1996) suggests that when people expect to interact with another person they

General discussion

Taken together these studies suggest that subliminal priming can enhance persuasion. We have found, however, that it does so only when certain conditions are met. Specifically, subliminal priming goal-relevant cognitions only influenced behavior and enhanced the persuasiveness of an ad targeting the goal when people were motivated to pursue the goal. In Study 1, we found that subliminally priming thirst increased the amount that people drank when they were thirsty but not when they were

Acknowledgements

The research in the paper was supported in part by grants from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council to both the second and third authors. We thank Michael Ross, Leandre Fabrigar, Derek Koehler, and Ziva Kunda for their insightful comments on an earlier version of the manuscript and the authors gratefully acknowledge the contributions of Trish Unruh, Tanya Nermerich, and Elizabeth Leal.

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Subliminal priming and persuasion: Striking while the iron is hot

Abstract

Section snippets

Study 1

Study 2

Study 3

General discussion

Acknowledgements

Journal of Experimental Social Psychology

Does subliminality matter to social psychology? Awareness of the stimulus versus awareness of its influence

Automaticity of social behavior: Direct effects of trait construct and stereotype activation

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Automatic information processing and social perception: The influence of trait information presented outside of conscious awareness on impression formation

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Stereotypes and prejudice: Their automatic and controlled components

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Measuring facial movements with the facial action coding system

On being cool and collected: Mood regulation in anticipation of social interaction

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Double-blind tests of subliminal self-help audiotapes

Psychological Science

Knowledge activation: Accessibility, applicability, and salience