Influence & Persuasion: Crash Course Media Literacy #6

Summary

The video script delves into the psychology behind advertising, explaining how jingles and catchy tunes are designed to stick in our minds and influence our purchasing decisions. It outlines the distinction between advertising, public relations, and propaganda, emphasizing the subtle yet powerful ways brands use market research and understanding of human needs to persuade consumers. The script references Edward Bernays' work on public opinion and Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs to illustrate how advertisers tap into our desires for safety, love, belonging, and self-actualization. It also discusses various persuasive techniques, including authority, likeability, consistency, scarcity, and emotional appeals, which can be employed both ethically and deceptively. The video concludes by highlighting the importance of media literacy in navigating the complex landscape of modern advertising.

Takeaways

• 🎵 Advertisements use catchy jingles to create memorable tunes that stick in consumers' heads.
• 🧐 The purpose of advertising is to promote products, events, or services, often by exploiting our psychological desires and needs.
• 📚 Advertising, public relations, and propaganda are distinct concepts, though their lines can blur, especially in the digital age.
• 🎥 Advertisements are crafted with market research and psychological tactics to influence consumer behavior.
• 👥 Edward Bernays was a pioneer in understanding how to persuade people to conform to societal trends through advertising.
• 🔑 Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs provides a framework for how ads can appeal to basic human desires, from safety to self-actualization.
• 💄 Ads like L'Oreal's 'Because you're worth it' campaign cleverly tap into both the desire to fit in and the aspiration to stand out.
• ✅ Persuasive techniques such as authority, likeability, consistency, scarcity, and emotional appeals are commonly used in ads to sway consumers.
• 🚫 Advertisements can sometimes use misleading logic or emotional manipulation, which can be harmful, like promoting unrealistic beauty standards.
• 🛒 The effectiveness of ads relies on pressing the right 'need buttons' and persuading consumers that the product will fulfill those needs.
• 🌐 The script also hints at the next topic: the prevalence and impact of targeted online advertising and its implications for consumer privacy and decision-making.

Q & A

What is the purpose of jingles in advertising?

Jingles are catchy tunes used in commercials that are specifically written to get stuck in people's heads, helping them remember the advertised product or service.

How do advertisers use psychological and sociological research to influence consumers?

Advertisers apply psychological and sociological research to understand human behavior and decision-making, using this knowledge to tap into consumers' desires and exploit their basic needs to persuade them to buy products.

What are the three main differences between advertising, public relations, and propaganda?

Advertising promotes a product, event, or service through public notices. Public relations manages the relationship between the public and a brand, often shaping the brand's image. Propaganda distributes information with the aim of promoting a specific point of view, often using misleading or biased content.

Why are advertisements constructed with a focus on certain desires and needs?

Advertisements are constructed to appeal to consumers' desires and needs because advertisers use market research to understand what makes people want to buy things, and they exploit these insights to increase the likelihood of a purchase.

Who was Edward Bernays and what was his contribution to the field of public relations?

Edward Bernays was a pioneer in the field of public relations who worked in the 1920s and '30s. He wrote 'Crystallizing Public Opinion,' which detailed how humans can be persuaded to change their habits to follow the crowd, emphasizing the herd mentality of humans.

What is Maslow's hierarchy of needs, and how does it relate to advertising?

Maslow's hierarchy of needs is a pyramid that identifies a progression of human needs, from basic physiological needs at the base to self-actualization at the top. Advertisements use this hierarchy to press different 'need buttons,' hoping to elicit a response that leads to a purchase.

How does the slogan 'Because you're worth it' from a hair dye advertisement appeal to multiple levels of Maslow's hierarchy?

The slogan 'Because you're worth it' appeals to the need for love and belonging by suggesting a better hair color fits in with beauty norms, as well as to the need for accomplishment and self-esteem by implying individual worth and the desire to be the best version of oneself.

What are some persuasive qualities that advertisers use to convince consumers?

Advertisers use qualities such as authority (expert recommendations), likeability (endorsements by celebrities), consistency (aligning with existing beliefs), scarcity (limited availability), and emotional appeals to persuade consumers.

Can you explain the concept of 'appeal to emotions' in advertising?

An appeal to emotions in advertising is a technique where an ad convinces consumers to take action by evoking strong feelings, such as sadness or compassion, to create a connection between the ad's content and the desired action, like making a donation.

What are some common logical fallacies used in advertising, and how do they work?

Common logical fallacies in advertising include appeal to emotions, false dilemma (limiting choices), red herring (introducing irrelevant information), and traditional wisdom (suggesting something is better because it's traditional). These fallacies work by manipulating the consumer's thought process to make the advertised product seem more appealing or necessary.

How can understanding advertising techniques and persuasive strategies help consumers?

Understanding advertising techniques and persuasive strategies can help consumers become more media literate, allowing them to recognize when they are being manipulated and make more informed decisions about their purchases.

Outlines

00:00

🎵 The Art of Advertising and Jingles 🎵

This paragraph introduces the concept of advertising through the use of catchy jingles in commercials designed to be memorable and influence consumer behavior. It explains that advertisers use psychological and sociological research to appeal to our basic needs and desires, with the goal of getting us to purchase their products. The script also outlines the difference between advertising, public relations, and propaganda, explaining that while advertising promotes products or services, public relations manages the relationship between the public and a brand, and propaganda distributes information to promote a specific viewpoint. The paragraph sets the stage for a deeper dive into the tactics used in advertising and how they can influence our purchasing decisions.

05:01

🧐 Understanding Advertising's Psychological Tactics 🧐

This paragraph delves into the psychological strategies used in advertising to persuade consumers. It discusses how advertisers tap into our basic needs, as described by Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs, to make us want to buy their products. The paragraph uses the example of a vintage L'Oreal hair dye advertisement to illustrate how an ad can appeal to both our need to fit in with societal beauty norms and our desire to stand out and be our best selves. It also covers various persuasive techniques such as authority, likeability, consistency, scarcity, and emotional appeals, which advertisers use to convince consumers to take action. The paragraph warns of the potential misuse of these techniques in advertising, such as making misleading claims or using fallacies, and emphasizes the importance of media literacy in navigating the persuasive messages we encounter daily.

Keywords

💡Jingles

Jingles are short musical tunes used in advertising to promote products or brands. They are designed to be catchy and memorable, with the aim of getting stuck in the consumer's head to increase brand recall. In the script, jingles are mentioned as a technique advertisers use to make their products memorable, with examples of tunes being sung to engage the audience.

💡Advertising

Advertising refers to the public promotion of products, events, or services, often through various media channels. It is an art that involves creating persuasive messages to influence potential customers. The script discusses advertising as a method used by brands to tap into human desires and persuade consumers to buy their products by exploiting basic needs.

💡Public Relations (PR)

Public Relations, or PR, is the practice of managing and influencing the relationship between a brand and the public. It involves crafting narratives and communications that shape public perception of a brand in a positive light. The script distinguishes PR from advertising, highlighting its role in managing brand image and reputation.

💡Propaganda

Propaganda is the dissemination of information intended to influence opinions and attitudes, often promoting a particular political cause or point of view. It can be misleading or biased. The script briefly introduces propaganda, noting its purpose and the potential for it to be difficult to distinguish from advertising, especially online.

💡Market Research

Market research is the process of gathering, analyzing, and interpreting information about a market, customers, and competitors. It is used by advertisers to understand consumer behavior and preferences. The script mentions market research as the basis for creating ads that appeal to consumers' desires and needs.

💡Edward Bernays

Edward Bernays was a pioneer in the field of public relations and propaganda, known for his influence on the psychological manipulation of public opinion. His work is highlighted in the script as foundational to understanding how humans can be persuaded to change habits to conform to societal norms.

💡Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs is a psychological theory that posits humans have a hierarchy of needs, starting with basic physiological needs and culminating in self-actualization. The script uses this concept to explain how advertisements target various levels of human needs to persuade consumers to make purchases.

💡Persuasive Techniques

Persuasive techniques are methods used to influence people's attitudes or actions. The script outlines several persuasive techniques used in advertising, such as authority, likeability, consistency, scarcity, and emotional appeals, which are employed to convince consumers to buy products.

💡Appeal to Emotion

An appeal to emotion is a persuasive technique that uses emotions to influence decision-making. The script provides the example of sad dog commercials with emotional music to tug at heartstrings and encourage donations, illustrating how emotions can be leveraged in advertising.

💡False Dilemma

A false dilemma is a logical fallacy in which only two options are presented when in fact more exist, limiting the scope of choice. The script mentions this in the context of laundry detergent ads that compare only two brands, suggesting a binary choice where many other options are available.

💡Red Herring

A red herring is a fallacy that involves introducing an irrelevant topic to divert attention from the main issue. The script uses a humorous example of a political ad that distracts voters by focusing on an unrelated fact about a candidate's family, rather than their political stance or qualifications.

💡Media Literacy

Media literacy is the ability to critically analyze and understand media messages, including the techniques used to persuade and the underlying motives of the creators. The script emphasizes the importance of media literacy in protecting oneself from manipulative advertising and understanding the intent behind media messages.

Highlights

Introduction to the concept of 'name that tune' and the psychological impact of jingles in advertising.

Explanation of how catchy tunes are used as a technique by advertisers to make their products memorable.

Definition of advertising, public relations, and propaganda, and their roles in shaping public perception.

Discussion on the difficulty in distinguishing between advertising, public relations, and propaganda in the digital age.

Insight into how advertisements are constructed using market research and psychological principles.

Historical context provided by Edward Bernays' work on public opinion and herd mentality in consumer behavior.

Illustration of how advertisements exploit basic human needs to persuade consumers.

Analysis of Maslow's hierarchy of needs and its application in advertising strategies.

Example of L'Oreal's 'Because you're worth it' slogan and its dual appeal to conformity and individualism.

Discussion on the persuasive qualities used in advertising, such as authority, likeability, and consistency.

Examination of scarcity and its effect on consumer desire, as demonstrated by limited edition products.

Critique of fallacious reasoning in advertising, such as appeals to emotion and false dilemmas.

Highlight of the potential negative impacts of advertising on body image and mental health.

Emphasis on the importance of media literacy in navigating persuasive advertising techniques.

Preview of the next episode's focus on targeted online advertising and its implications for consumer privacy.

Credits and production notes for Crash Course Media Literacy, showcasing the team behind the series.

Transcripts

Let’s play a little game of “name that tune.”

I’m going to start singing a tune, and I want you see if you can finish it without me.

Ok here it goes:

“Ba da ba ba ba…”

What about, “I am stuck on Band Aid Brand....”

Did you hear that in the little kids’ voice? That’s a cute one.

OK last one: “Gimme a break, gimme a break.”

C’mon you had to know that one.

If you didn’t finish at least one of those on your own, I’d be shocked.

These little songs advertisers use in commercials are called jingles, and you know these popular ones because they were written specifically to get stuck in your head.

Catchy tunes are just one technique advertisers use to get you to remember them and, hopefully, buy their stuff.

For years psychologists and sociologists have studied why humans buy things, and brands use that research to hack our brains and open our wallets.

By applying the skills we’ve learned so far, we can protect ourselves from buying yet another fancy frappuccino off the not-so-secret secret menu.

Today we’re going to un-hack your brain on advertising.

[Theme Music]

First things first: let’s define advertising and its close cousins, public relations and propaganda.

An advertisement is a public notice promoting a product, event, or service.

Advertising is the art of creating those.

Sometimes brands create ads themselves, and sometimes they hire companies to do it for them.

Yes, just like the people from Mad Men.

Public relations, or PR, is something different.

PR is the management of the relationship between the public (that’s you) and a brand.

PR tells the public what the brand is up to and tries to make the brand look as good as possible.

They’re the people who write the apology when someone makes a mistake or build the hype around the latest iPhone release.

Finally, propaganda is information distributed with the direct purpose of promoting a certain point of view.

This info is often misleading or biased, and propaganda is usually used to promote specific political viewpoints.

These definitions may seem tidy, but the differences between these fields can be really hard to distinguish out in the real world, especially online.

Don’t worry, we’ll talk a lot more about propaganda later in the course.

Last time on Crash Course Media Literacy, we learned that all media is constructed.

Creators make choices each step of the way, from their work’s purpose and focus to the point of view they use to tell their story.

Advertisements work the same way, from the split-second ad you swipe through before watching your friends’ stories

to elaborate movie trailers that get as much hype as the movie itself.

On top of that, ads are created using a century’s worth of market research: experiments carried out to discover what makes us want to buy things.

Advertisers use that knowledge to tap into our desires, often exploiting our most basic needs –

not only the food and shelter kind, but the love and belonging kind, too.

One of the pioneers of this somewhat sinister art was Edward Bernays.

Working in the 1920s and ‘30s, he wrote:

“The human being—male or female—is a herd animal.

Man is fearful of solitude...He is more sensitive to the voice of the herd than to any other influence.”

That’s from his 1923 book Crystallizing Public Opinion, which became a classic in the public relations field.

It detailed how humans can be persuaded to change their habits if it will help them to follow the crowd.

Think back to middle school.

What was that one trend that everyone had to follow, or you totally felt left out?

Friendship bracelets, the latest pair of Jordans, a fidget spinner, one of those little electronic keychain pets – seriously what was the deal with those things?

Chances are you or your friends bought them because everyone else had one – you wanted to fit in.

Advertisements love to play on this need, and that’s how trends and fads happen in the first place.

In the 1940’s, psychologist Abraham Maslow added another piece to this puzzle.

He identified a hierarchy of needs he said all humans had.

It’s set up like a pyramid.

At the base, the foundation, all humans need food and water, shelter, and sleep.

Just above that, they need to feel safe, too.

Then comes the need for love and feeling like you belong somewhere.

After that, we need to feel accomplished, like we matter.

At the tippy top of the pyramid is the need to fulfill our destiny, to be our best selves.

Now all of these needs, combined with our natural desire to follow the crowd, are like little buttons on our hearts and brains.

Advertisements press different combinations of buttons in hopes that we’ll respond the right way.

Usually that means buying their product.

The sales pitch of most modern ads is that product X will satisfy your need for Y.

For example, security systems promise one of our most basic instincts: safety.

We want to be safe, so we buy alarms to keep out the bad guys.

And Slim Jims? They promise food – of a sort.

Down at the bottom of the pyramid.

But some products claim to satisfy multiple needs higher up on that pyramid.

Let’s head into the Thought Bubble to take a closer look.

Check out this vintage ad for hair dye.

It features L’Oreal’s iconic slogan “Because you’re worth it.”

They’ve used this slogan more or less since 1971.

In this ad, it’s used with the claim that this dye is the most expensive in the country.

Usually, that’s not a great way to sell a lot of anything.

But the slogan “because you’re worth it” presses a lot of our human need buttons.

For starters, any advertisement for hair dye implies that natural hair color is boring.

So, for other people to like us, to stick with the herd, our hair has to be a different, better color.

But still a pretty normal, human-y color, so we don’t stick out from the herd.

That’s the button for feeling loved and like we belong.

But there’s also that need for accomplishment, like we matter. We’re worth it.

The ad is saying, you’re hot. You’re the best. You deserve this product.

You deserve the most expensive dye, even though it’s luxury. Nay, BECAUSE it’s luxury.

Not only is this ad an appeal to stick with the herd, to blend in with beauty norms, but it’s also an appeal to individualism.

It’s an appeal to that middle of the pyramid and the tippy top, the desire to become our best selves and rise above the rest of the herd.

It’s genius, really.

If you’ve ever screamed TREAT YOSELF while splurging on a pair of designer shoes after a long day, you’ve fallen into this ad trap.

Thanks for the help, Thought Bubble.

Once an advertiser knows which “need button” to press, they need to persuade you that it will work.

Turns out that there are a few things that really persuade us.

The first is authority: if we think the person talking is an expert, we’re likely to believe them.

Like in those “5 out of 5 dentists recommend” toothpaste commercials.

Dentists know teeth, right?

The next is likeability: if we like them, are friends with them, or trust them, we’re also likely to listen.

That's why brands use extremely popular and respected celebrities, like, say, Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, to sell watches or perfume.

Same with consistency: if what’s being said vibes with what we already believe, we’ll probably go along with it.

If everything you’ve ever heard about this new true crime podcast says its great and thrilling and awesome,

you probably wouldn’t believe your coworker’s negative review of it.

If there’s a consensus around something, if it’s popular, we are easily swayed to think it’s good, too.

And if we think it’s a scarce resource and we could have a piece of it, it’s even more attractive.

So, if everyone else had an iPhone and you didn’t, you’d probably really want one.

And if a limited edition version came out that was signed by Beyonce you’d want that one even more.

Advertisers often use these persuasive qualities in benign ways to get us to buy one brand of chocolate over another or something.

But they can also be used against us by being baked into false claims.

They’re not lying, exactly, but making claims based on poor or misleading logic.

One popular type of fallacy in advertising is an appeal to emotions.

This is when an ad convinces you to take action by tugging at your heartstrings.

Those sad sick dog commercials with the Sarah McLachlan song?

That’s an appeal to emotions.

Just because sick dogs make you sad doesn’t automatically mean an organization deserves a donation; it just makes you link the two together.

(I mean, please still save the sick dogs, this is just an example folks.)

Then there’s the false dilemma, where an ad shows you a limited number of choices so you won’t consider all of the options.

Laundry detergent ads for example, seem to always go “head to head” with another brand –

but only one other brand, even though there are dozens.

Another popular one is the red herring, the presentation of something totally irrelevant to distract you from the issue at hand.

This happens in politics all the time.

Ever seen a TV campaign ad during a local election that shouted something totally unrelated at you?

Like, “Don’t elect Dan, his daughter eats CEREAL!”

And suddenly you’re wondering what’s wrong with cereal until you forget that cereal has nothing to do with politics.

Then there’s traditional wisdom, the idea that you should pick something because that’s how your grandmom or your old man used to do it.

But your old man used a record player because there wasn’t any other option, not because he wanted to lug around a crate full of vinyl to every single party.

All of these fallacies and persuasive techniques can be used for good and for evil and in between.

Public service campaigns can get kids to stop smoking or invest in local journalism.

But on the other hand, cosmetics ads can harm teens’ body images, causing eating disorders and depression.

The better psychologists and sociologists get at persuading the human brain –

even if their intentions are good – the better bad actors get at it, too.

All the more reason to stretch your media literacy muscles.

Today we talked about how advertisements can make you change your mind.

Next time on Crash Course Media Literacy we’re going to tell you when and where they’re doing it.

We’re going to talk all about those creepy targeted ads that follow you around the internet and much, much more.

See you next time. Until then, I’m Jay Smooth.

Crash Course Media Literacy is filmed in the Dr. Cheryl C. Kinney Studio in Missoula, MT.

It’s made with the help of all of these nice people, and our animation team is Thought Cafe.

Crash Course is a Complexly production.

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