Subliminal Advertising: Myth, Reality, and Consumer Impact

Subliminal advertising has been one of the most alluring and controversial features of the marketing industry since the 1950s, when moviegoers were allegedly exposed to surreptitious signals while watching a film. Some alarmists claim that the American public is constantly bombarded with subliminal messages designed to sell products, promote political agendas, or simply induce particular states of mind. In fact, Russian scientists became so concerned about the potential of subliminal ads to influence television viewers that they developed a device to detect and disable subliminal messages being broadcast on national television (Voyteskhovskiy).

Concern about the potential power of subliminal advertising may be unfounded, however. Scientific studies have been relatively inconclusive regarding the efficacy of messages delivered subliminally — that is, below conscious awareness. Many marketing experts and researchers argue that subliminal advertising does not work at all, and that public fascination with it undermines the integrity of the marketing industry. Nevertheless, subliminal messages retain a significant allure in popular culture, and evidence does suggest that popular media may contain "priming" elements that, subliminal or not, work to alter behavior, consumer patterns, and emotional states (Bargh).

Subliminal messages are "presented so briefly that the audience isn't consciously aware of them, but that nonetheless may influence the audience's behavior" (Bargh, p. 1). Common examples include flash-frame images embedded within ordinary advertisements or within the body of a television show or film. The hidden cues were once placed on the 25th frame of a cinema reel and have been referred to in industry vernacular as "25th frame" messages (Voyteskhovskiy, p. 1). Advanced media editing technology has since facilitated the creation and insertion of subliminal messages into all media, including audio.

For example, Moore draws attention to the "relentless annual dirge of pop carols" bombarding shoppers' ears during the Christmas season (p. 2). Although carols may not be embedded with subliminal statements like "Buy Now!" they may work "by awakening warm feelings in their customers" that prompt greater spending and reduce the anxiety of overspending (Moore, p. 2). In this sense, the subliminal effect of Christmas music relates less to specific products than to the general spirit of giving.

The effectiveness of subliminal advertising depends more on the mood it creates than on whether a specific message has been placed below conscious awareness (Bargh). This phenomenon is referred to as priming by clinical researchers. The definition of subliminal advertising may therefore need to include not only the visual and auditory signals that are deliberately and surreptitiously embedded into media, but also the subtext that media-literate consumers are at least partly conscious of. Many advertisements contain messages that are not subliminal in the traditional sense. The imagery in an advertisement for Mr. Clean, for example, depicts a benevolent yet physically imposing man who magically appears to eliminate the dirt troubling housewives. Mr. Clean is simultaneously old, wise, and strong — qualities used to sell an ordinary cleaning product. Though Mr. Clean advertisements probably do not embed images in the 25th frame, the ad conveys its message somewhat covertly. Only media-literate viewers are likely to notice the subtext and make fully informed consumer decisions.

Children are exposed to a wide array of products marketed specifically to them. Although advertisements for clothes, toys, and games may not contain technically subliminal messages, the music, actors, colors, and scripting are carefully crafted to evoke an emotional response — to stimulate desire and longing for the advertised product. Research confirms that children are significantly influenced by the advertisements they encounter on television. A report published in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine revealed that "for each additional hour per day that a child watched television, an average of one additional request was made for an advertised product" (Motluk, p. 1).

Advertisements targeting young children can be viewed as inherently subliminal because pre-literate and pre-media-literate children have no framework for critically evaluating what is being communicated about a product. They only know that a commercial produced a feeling — and that feeling made them want a particular toy. In this way, the boundary between overt advertising and subliminal influence collapses entirely for the youngest viewers.

Gray insists that subliminal advertising is only a "myth that the public would like to believe is true" (p. 2). Likewise, Hal Shoup, an executive Vice President of the American Association of Advertising Agencies, claimed that subliminal advertising is largely a "myth" and that advertisers do not use subliminal messages because there is "no interest in it" (cited in Teinowitz, p. 2). Research on the effectiveness of subliminal advertising has been generally inconclusive, but the influence of subliminal messages on an unsuspecting public may be "unpredictable and unsafe" (Voyteskhovskiy). Moreover, some of the studies cited to disprove their efficacy rely on faulty methodology. For example, Gray participated in a study in which single-digit numbers were embedded into advertisements; participants were asked to write down the first single-digit number that came to mind after watching the commercials, and no correlation was found between their responses and the embedded number.

This study is flawed for two reasons. First, single-digit numbers carry no emotional impact. Subliminal messages likely work for many of the same reasons that overt messages work: they convey emotionally laden or evocative material. Second, the effectiveness of subliminal advertising cannot be assessed in a single focus-group session. Researchers should instead be interested in the long-term effects of repeated exposure on consumer behavior and thought patterns. Many standard, non-subliminal advertisements require several viewings — or even months of media saturation — before they "sink in" and begin to alter consumer behavior.