1. Chicken Soup for the Brain- Andrejevic uses the anecdote of Campbell's label redesign project to introduce the concept of neuromarketing. This concept goes off the belief that consumers need to be examined in ways that bypass the potentially deceptive character of their conscious and controlled responses. To do this high-tech market research overlaps with surveillance and interrogation techniques. Andrejevic compares this to dealing with suspects of crime. The neuromarketing researchers monitor somatic responses such as heart rate, respiration, skin conductance, facial expressions and pupil dilation to find out what things people respond to and how. The bodily reactions promised to provide a level of accuracy that their words and conscious thoughts could not. Andrejevic quotes Martin Lindstrom, the author of Buyology, by writing ‘Consumers will never, ever tell the truth ... It’s not because they’re lying – because they’re not – they’re just unaware.’ Thus making neuromarketing hugely important for the advertising industry. The media fascination with neuroscience helped promote Campbell’s and the Campbell’s story boosted the visibility of neuromarketing. A win for both sides. With the amount of advertising out there, the powerful appeal of neuromarketing is its power to cut through the clutter that marketers themselves have made. This while reading it seem super immoral but I'm keeping an open mind while reading more about it.
2. Brain Appeal- This section is pretty short. It talks about the surge in interest in the neurosciences. This surge includes neurobiology, psychopharmacology, biological psychiatry, brain imaging, and various neuro disciplines. They are becoming increasingly prominent in a variety of cultural formations, from self-help guides and the arts to advertising and public health programs. Neuromarketers are interested in direct forms of influence – in particular those that bypass conscious reflection on the part of consumers. If fMRI scans provide ‘direct’ access to
consumers’ brains, they can also provide insight regarding how best to directly influence these brains, and thus their owners. One line that particularly struck me in this section was "It is the combination of the structuring of self-help guidelines with economic (in the double sense of the term) strategies for guiding people’s conduct that results in what Rose calls techniques for governing “at a distance” . . . by shaping the ways they understand and enact their own freedom’" (4) This line reminds me of what Edward Bernays was saying about Propaganda.
3. Brain Whispering and Somatic Markers- This section talks about how great advertising strikes a responsive chord with consumers where it matters most: the subconscious. Only neurological testing can make
the “deep dive” required to access that level of the brain and discover how it responds to all forms of advertising, in every medium. This testing gives producers the information they need to develop material the brain loves and remembers making it more effective marketing. In reading this section, I was most interested in the switch from the word consumer to brain. I feel as though this is more dehumanizing thus making it seem less immoral because these aren't people-they are brains. Another interesting part of this section was the somanic marker hypothesis. In marketing terms, the theory of somatic markers reframes the character of emotional appeals. As long as emotional appeals are portrayed as threats to the exercise of reason, their use by marketers can be framed as a challenge to ideals of personal autonomy, rational-critical deliberation and the forms of citizenship with which these are associated. If, by contrast, emotions can be framed as adjuncts to reason – on the same side,
rather than pitted against it – soliciting them no longer poses the same threat as it once was. This is a great point- feelings do assist with rational thinking and decision making. So marketers should work with emotions facilitating reason, not fighting it.
4. From Causation to Correlation- This fourth section talks about how the study of the emotional component of consumer decision making can become an empirical science rather than a matter of psychological theory and speculation. This line also concerns me ethically speaking - "Neuromarketing treats consumers as bundles of nerve centres that respond to different kinds of stimuli and form triggerable pathways as a result." (9) How can we as public relations professionals read things like that and not have an issue with it. These are people. Public Relations isn't only about influencing people, its also about human interest and bettering the world with the spread of information. Another concerning aspect of this section was the Neuromarketing promises not simply to provide clues about how best to directly influence the emotional triggers that allegedly shape subconscious consumer cognition, but also to allow marketers to see the consumers' truest selves and therefore target them even better. This reminds me of internet advertising and how creepy it is that the cookies on our computers gather information on us to target market. This is even more invasive than that and many people dislike the degree of invasion with the computers. The most impressive example of the power of the brain in marketing was the study done on music. It turned out that the brain activation measurements were more accurate in predicting sales than the teens’ stated preferences.
5. NeuroPromises- This section is a conclusion for the article. It wraps of everything that has been said. It highlights the growing influence of the neuromarketing and the difference between the results of neuromarketing research and self reporting. I am convinced that this is a great marketing strategy and it will make a ton of money. I'm just worried about the ethics of selling to peoples' unconscious, especially if the marketing provokes them to buy things that they cannot afford.
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