James Vicary: The Use Of Subliminal Messages

Introduction:

The use of subliminal messaging emerged in 1957 when market researcher James Vicary conducted a fraudulent experiment at a New Jersey drive-in-theatre, at which he flashed the words ‘eat popcorn’ and ‘drink Coca-Cola’ for 1/3000 of a second every five seconds over a screening of the film The Picnic. Vicary then went on to claim that this trail boosted coke sales by 56% and popcorn sales by 18%. For the purpose of this essay the following definition of subliminal messages has been used: ‘A subliminal message is an affirmation or message either auditory or visual presented below the normal limits of human auditory or visual perception. ‘(www.mindfithypnosis.com). It is techniques such as these along with the use of semiotics, the study of signs that began to approach cultural studies in the late 1960’s, which pose questions of an ethical nature. Are advertisers and people with the power and ability to enforce such techniques going too far? Is the use of subliminal messaging too intrusive? But on the flip side, with little scientific

There have been many studies conducted, in an attempt to gage a perspective into just how successful subliminal messages can be. One of these particular studies required participants to challenge their senses into whether or not they were actually perceiving hidden stimuli. The test presented individuals with visuals which were near impossible for the conscious mind to receive, when asked what they saw the observers claimed to have seen nothing. They were then asked to guess what they think may have been presented to them, and it was concluded that “ the consistent result found in these early studies was that the observers’ guesses regarding the stimuli were more correct than would be expected on the basis of chance guessing”