Reply to comment

The research referred to in the article above is unfortunately not an example of “Subliminal advertising”. If it was, there should at least be some reference to the duration of the exposures. That is, how long time was the subjects exposed to the communication in milliseconds? The only thing that is stated is that the subjects were exposed to “faint pictures” and that they also had to perform either an easy task or a more difficult task. It is not stated anywhere how the researchers came to the conclusion that these “inventions” fits into “Subliminal advertising”.

In the “original” fairy tale experiment from the fifties, which was a fraud, the story tells that the subjects watched a movie in a theater and were exposed to a message which lasted for 40 milliseconds. In what way has the UCL research tried to replicate this fact? Furthermore, it is highly questionable how “faint pictures” of an iron would affect higher order brain processing such as decision making which in turn would lead to the purchase of an iron? In the “original” case there were no tasks but a nice movie and it was Crystal Clear (and not faint) text messages that explicitly told what the subjects should do, i.e. “Drink Coke and buy popcorn”. What should a person do who sees an iron? Start ironing shirts? However, this does not hinder the researcher from speculating that the consumers’ decisions would be manipulated if it was a real situation.

Jim Vicary’s grand hoax is still, 50 years after its unfortunate birth, intriguing the public as well as some researchers.

Dr Patrik Nilsson
Stockholm Institute of Communication Science - Stics