Mind Games - Understanding The Influence Of Cognitive Priming
Today I will talk about cognitive priming which is defined as a phenomenon where exposure to one stimulus influences our response to the next.
The psychology behind cognitive priming
I first heard about cognitive priming when reading “thinking fast and slow” by Daniel Kahneman
Thousands of years ago our primitive ancestors used techniques to maintain survival as a species which we still utilize today, without ever knowing it. Foreign objects were inspected carefully and hesitantly, they were deemed suspicious and threatening as well. Anything which our ancestors could not recognize instantly was seen as a potential threat to their lives and therefore they made sure to be increasingly hesitant towards these new “things”. If however upon inspection our ancestors found that the threat was not actually harmful then they would no longer be on high alert and in the future when they saw this object or animal there guard would remain down. Familiarity is comfort. When you are comfortable you assume that there is no threat nearby and therefore let your guard down. We become lazier and less attentive, as little energy as possible is spent on recognition because we know that in the past this thing has not harmed us so therefore now it will not. We remember. It is familiar.
Using this principle social scientists have come up with certain psychological mind tricks which are meant to catch you off-guard. Hence why riddle like “the bat and ball” are so effective, here it is: A bat and a ball cost £1.10. The bat costs £1 more than the ball. How much does the ball cost?
Instinctively you probably thought well $1 for the bat and $0.10 for the ball however the answer is in fact $1.05 for the bat and $0.05 for the ball. This is not complex arithmetic but it tricks your mind with a false familiarity and resemblance to the other thousands of mathematics problems you have done in your life to shortcut the actual math equation and get $1 and $0.10. Because of what you had read before the riddle you were probably expecting a trick question so may have gotten it right after doing the proper equation in your head however for most unaware people they do not take the time because for them they see no danger, no trap and no surprises.
These simple mistakes compound and may not have large affects on our day-to-day ,lives however can be, and are, exploited by politicians looking for votes, companies looking for your money and other corporations looking for your loyalty.
By priming you they are able to veer you into the direction which they desire without you ever knowing.
Priming is all about associations, when you prime someone you are expecting them to associate a certain stimuli with another. Here is an example from a website which explains priming very well “If you own or manage a restaurant and order too much Italian wine, the best way to psychologically prime your customers to buy this particular type, is to play Italian music in the background.
Cognitive priming impacts on the real world
A 2000 study showed that voters voted for more funding for schools when the voting location was at a school. Images also acted as primers which influenced the way that people make decisions without them even realizing.
It is very plausible that we are being primed every single time we go on our phones or other device from thousands of companies fighting for our attention, money or vote. imagine how powerful an un-skippable ad is when you realize that even without the recipient being interested in the product, they are being influenced subconsciously so that the next time they make a decision about something related to the ad they might change their answer because of an ad they say a few weeks ago which they cannot even remember.
A study was conducted in a workplace in the kitchen. In this workplace employees who used the milk from the kitchen were suggested a price to pay from a sheet of paper and based on this could pay as much or as little as they would like. The experimenters placed a picture above the milk each day a certain number of days , one day would be a pair of eyes and the other day would be flowers. On the day where the eyes were there the price paid for milk was drastically lower than on the days where the flowers were on top
After doing a lot of research about social priming I have found many skeptics and a lot of people who say that many of the social priming experiments conducted around 2010-2015 were not replicable. I understand that many scientists in the social psychology field were exposed for having forged some results, however I believe that this should not completely remove the conclusions which Kahneman has proposed. We cannot altogether abandon the idea that priming plays a role in our own human minds, a mind which we do not yet understand. Despite being conscious animals who are aware of our surroundings, many of our decisions are sub-conscious. Actions performed without us being aware of them happening, these actions are those which are familiar and primitive.
Remember to keep an eye on things which look too familiar. You are probably being tricked.
Thanks for reading,
Max