Improving Consumer Decisions: The Conscious Use of Primes as Performance Enhancers

Abstract

Through this article we examine ways through which consumers can take advantage of marketers' priming attempts and make better decisions. Specifically, we investigate what happens when individuals are made aware of primes that may potentially improve their performance. Using an Embedded Figures Test, we demonstrate that individuals can be consciously primed into an analytic thinking mindset and perform better when they believe that the prime will enhance performance. Individuals are able to successfully ignore the prime when they believe that the prime hinders performance. Utilizing both holistic and analytic primes and by alternating the valence of the prime's potential outcome, we are able to disentangle the conscious effects of primes from demand effects. We discuss how these findings may lead to and suggest avenues for future research.

A Dieting Facilitator on the Fridge Door: Can Dieters Deliberately Apply Environmental Dieting Cues to Lose Weight?

“…The following evidence supports the assumption that contrast effects can occur for goal-incongruent influences but do not occur for goal-congruent influences of which individuals are aware. When individuals actually trained for a task, they performed better when they were told that the training had a positive influence than when they were told that the training had a negative influence ( Nicolao et al, 2016 ). This suggests that individuals could counteract the actual positive influence from the training when they believed that the training had a negative influence.…”

“…Importantly, this effect only occurred when the training actually prepared individuals for the subsequent task. This rules out a mere placebo effect ( Nicolao et al, 2016 )—that is, an effect which cannot be attributed to an actual treatment but to individuals’ belief of being treated ( Fontaine et al, 2016 ).…”