PP247 Chapter Notes - Chapter 8-2: John Kenneth Galbraith, Subliminal Stimuli, Theodore Levitt
Document Summary
Advertisers have often been accused of using techniques which manipulate and control the behaviour of consumers and hence violate their autonomy. Puffery- the practice by a seller of making exaggerated, highly fanciful or suggestive claims about a g/s. Considered a legitimate, necessary, and very successful tool of the advertising industry. It is bragging carefully designed to achieve a very definite effect. Our act of purchasing something is completely controlled by factors in our environment and in our history of reinforcement. Indirect information- information derived not from the content of what is said but from the fact that it is said so often and vividly that it sticks in one"s mind. Subliminal messages can be used to control consumers. Puffery, indirect information transfer, and subliminal advertising are techniques of manipulation and control whose success shows that many of us have forfeited our autonomy and become a community, or herd, of packages souls.
