An Essay On Blink By Malcolm Gladwell

Research has shown that physically attractive spokespeople can add to the effectiveness of an advertisement. In the novel, Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell people view attractive humans as comforting, nice, athletic, and intelligent and this could be true, but more often appearance is not reality. Priming is the effect of one stimulus in a brain that affects another stimulus which controls snap decisions and is why humans choose attractive people over others. Advertisements use attractive models to get an audience to want the models traits which makes the product desirable.

Attractive models have positively affected the advertising business. People's judgement of beautiful humans starts at an early age. Little kids have been proven to be primed

to be friends with attractive kids because they learn that from adults. In the Journal of Marketing Research, “Nursery school children were found to evaluate their classmates with the adult stereotype. Adults unacquainted with the children rated the children based on physical attractiveness. Then the children picked who they like most of their classmates and male unattractive kids were less popular”(Michael J. Baker and Gilbert A. Churchill, Jr, 539). Already at a young age, kids have been primed to agree with the adult stereotype of aiding themselves with attractive peers. Children associate themselves with kids who are popular because the popular kids are good kids. This proves that seeing attractive models advertise products, both kids and adults will believe the spokesperson. Watching models on Tv only causes consumers to want their desired traits. In the Journal of Marketing Research, a study done in 1977 states: “Research cited indicates that people, when given just a simple stimulus of an individual, will readily associate socially desirable traits and character with attractive people”(Michael J. Baker and Gilbert A. Churchill, Jr, 538). When people see an attractive model selling something that person automatically wants the product because he or she aspires to have the traits the model posses. The use of attractive models helps advertisements because it causes the audience to desire their product more. Judging a book by its cover as people due with models is directly related to how people make snap decisions in Blink. Often, Female audiences compare themselves to female models due to societal pressures derives from judging and making snap decisions.
Females feel they have to look like the attractive models in ads, therefore they buy the product being sold.

Models give a desirable appeal to the product being advertised which influences viewers to buy it: “When an attractive model is used, respondents have more favorable evaluations of both the advertisement and the product being advertised”(Joseph 1982). Models help promote products and the advertisements to be more favorable to a female audience. Advertisements use models to get a positive response from the audience. Females consistently compare themselves to beautiful models in advertisements: “The three motives for comparison include self-evaluation, self-enhancement, and self-improvement (Martin and Kennedy, 1994). Martin and Kennedy (1994) conducted a study that focused on female adolescents and their motive for comparing their physical attractiveness to that of models in advertising. Advertisements hone in on a woman's insecurities and uses that to get the audience hooked on the product and the advertisement. Female audiences want to have the traits models have that way they buy the products the models are promoting. Models prime all ages of women to desire the products in advertisements. The need for a beautiful appearance dicated the snap decisions people make. Furthermore, priming contributes to how people perceive others outside of

advertisement.
In the novel, Blink by Malcolm Gladwell, people judge others based on physical qualities such as people do in advertisements. In the Warren Harding case people completely misjudged him and thought he was an excellent person, when in reality he was not: “His suppleness, combined with his bigness of frame, and large, wide-set rather glowing eyes, heavy black hair, and markedly bronze complexion gave him some handsomeness of an Indian. His courtesy as he surrendered his seat to the other costumer suggested genuine friendliness toward all mankind”(73). Looks persuade people to believe different ideas about a person. Harding's attractiveness was appealing to people. The way others view Harding is how audiences view models in advertisements. Beauty is good Warren Harding was not necessarily the man everyone believed: “Warren Harding was not a particularly intelligent man. He like to play poker and golf and drink and, most all, to chase women”(73). What people originally thought about Harding was completely wrong, he was an average guy who liked women. Harding did not possess the intelligence and the kindness others thought. Models in advertisements could be exactly like Harding, but nobody would know because they are only used for their looks to indorse money for advertisements. Physical appearance controls how others perceive people not matter the personality of someone. Looks will always win in making a snap decision.
Appearance is what advertisements use to sell products and it is what people use in making snap decisions. People should realize how easy they are to convince to buy a product that only looks good. Attractiveness should not be the first thing people see in someone, but to learn to look at their other qualities if they could. Today, cops have been accused of finding a person suspicious because they are from the hood. The shootings that have occurred over racial issues between cops and African Americans could possibly be resolved if cops didn’t let the judgment of physical qualities dictate their snap decisions, only if they would.