neuromarketing

The Texting Dead: 14 Ways We Are More Borg than Human

June 26, 2015 by Dr. Tracy Bennett

Originally published by The Good Men Project

You know why I LOVE The Walking Dead television series? Because I’m a nerd. I love to forever analyze how humans interact with nonhumans and how the nonvirtual interfaces with the virtual. But the confusing thing these days is that our virtual and nonvirtual worlds are so intertwined, it’s getting harder to tell them apart. I propose that the idea of zombies that lead us to the end of times is actually screen media.

My all time favorite novels are either fantasy or sci fi. I mostly love people, but I also love technology. I’m an introverted extrovert. Love to read. Love to surf the Internet and Facebook. Love to party. Most of all, I love to discuss apocalyptic, science fiction scenarios with real live humans (“If you could bring five people and five things on an island…”).

In regard to my opinions about technology, it turns out I’m a moderate. In other words, I’m not firmly in the techno-pessimist or techno-optimist camp. I realize we have reached the point of outsourcing so much to our screens that we are cyborg, yet we still crave one-to-one real time face contact more than anything else. After three years of intensive study about screen safety, I’m essentially an independent who loves her tech while helping clients manage through the very real perils of kids participating in screen activities too much too soon.

In regard to being cyborgs, our screens provide us powerful life tools. They are literally changing the structures of our brains. Specifically, scientists are identifying increased cortical thickness in commonly used neurological pathways among screen users. “ Use it or lose it” applies to brain development. Technology is changing us in ways we aren’t aware of, and in ways we don’t understand. Not only are we interacting with the world, and each other, differently, but we are absorbing nibbles of screen content like an amoeba absorbs nutrients. Sometimes we are active viewers, other times virtual images are flashing before us embedding messaging while we remain largely unaware of its impact. Some of these images are designed to brand and make us devoted paying customers, called neuromarketing.

It’s time we face it. Unless you go to extraordinary lengths for online privacy, you no longer have any. Every valuable mouse click you make is captured, categorized, and used for profit. If you online shop for a refrigerator today, you will be retargeted with refrigerator ads tomorrow. And if you refuse to click? No worries, your Samsung television will record your conversations and use those for retargeting. Facebook knows, and uses, everybody in your smartphone’s address book and your location to locate connectability and buy ability. Information about your habits is BIG business, and every move of your mouse is being collected to identify patterns and vulnerabilities. Rich corporations utilize powerful technology resources to get into your pocket in ways you haven’t even fathomed.

I recently went to see the fantasy/sci-fi thriller, Ex Machina. I left spooked, saying I felt like this is the first time my eye could not distinguish CGI from reality. I spent the movie looking for a distortion in how the robots looked or moved, and there wasn’t one! I panicked a little bit thinking, how are we going to tell fake news from real news if even video footage can be faked? Furthermore, machine learning is already a real thing. In other words, machines can now evolve based on their learning without human interface! Robots are here. They are patrolling parking lots collecting big data, including your license plate number, speed, time of arrival and departure, and giving directions when asked. They can even scan your face for identity and your body for weapons. As soon as you are identified, data about your habits populate the screen. Even mall billboards have this capacity now, identifying you and immediately displaying ads corporations are sure you’ll like. Privacy as we’ve known it is dead, dead, dead.

If you’re still in denial that we are irreversibly computer-dependent à la Jetsons, consider these 14 ways we are already more Borg than human:

We get speeding tickets from a camera and computer rather than a uniformed police officer.
Computer voices lead us through endless mazes of flowchart selections as the only option for “customer service.”
We order groceries with a button or a wand, and we pay with our thumbprint (see Amazon Dash and AmazonFresh).
We breakup on text and bully through online ratings and social media shaming, happy to escape that messy feeling when your hurtful missile hits its victim (psychologists call this the online disinhibition effect).
Our kids schedule online gaming playdates and text each other while hanging out.
We seek validation through social media and chat rooms. Computers have become our soothing tonic. ((hug))
Yesterday, you reached for the rewind button on your radio because you got distracted. And if it was a podcast, it actually worked.
We learn about gender roles from webcomic trolls and sex from online porn.
We can no longer remember things because our smartphone is our external hippocampal harddrive.
Bank tellers greet us with, “Good afternoon, please swipe your card and enter your pin.”
We are so exhausted from fractured attention and overload due to computer data, we have little energy left over for people. But we somehow scavenge enough for more screen media like TV or Facebook. (Please someone invent a can of wine-flavored oxygenated glucose.)
My new client who begged not to have ANY notation on my computer because of fear for government interference isn’t even psychotic.
Apple Watch
Google Glass
Virtual Reality

Am I right? Screen media is our drug. We are never satiated. We are too hungry for it to go to bed on time. We are so hungry for it it’s what we check first thing in the morning. As a clinical psychologist, it allows me to reach an audience of thousands at this very moment instead of a single individual. Bottom line, it lights up the same pleasure center part of our brains that every drug of addiction does.

Our greatest fear is that technology will end our planet and our greatest hope is that it will save it.

Name five people and five things you want on your post-apocalyptic island (genies and meatball sub sandwich factories aren’t allowed). If you didn’t say your laptop, you’re lying.

“Siri, add closing and send.”

I’m the mom psychologist who will help you GetYourKidsInternetSafe.

Onward to More Awesome Parenting,

Tracy S. Bennett, Ph.D.
Mom, Clinical Psychologist, CSUCI Adjunct Faculty
GetKidsInternetSafe.com

Did You Know the Internet is Programmed Like a Slot Machine? 6 Ways Internet Marketers Are Grooming Our Kids to Be Paying Customers

January 22, 2014 by Dr. Tracy Bennett

When we are online, we often view content designed to get us to buy something. Companies and people who make money this way are called online marketers. The more customers these marketers attract, the more money they make. Today’s GKIS article teaches you how to recognize the tricks marketers use to earn money. If you are able to recognize these tricks, you will be more likely to avoid buying things you don’t need or want.

6 Tricks Marketers Use to Encourage You to Buy

Neuromarketing Strategies

Neuromarketing strategies refer to the tricks created from research that studies customer motivations, preferences, and buying behaviors. With customer data collected from brain scans (which areas of the brain engage with certain ad content), eye movement tracking, and customer reports, marketers design their products and advertisements for the best appeal. This means that advertisers know what we respond to and how we respond better than we even know!

Illusion of Scarcity

The illusion of scarcity refers to the technique of only offering a product or a discount for a limited time. By using terms like BUY NOW or LIMITED-TIME OFFER, marketers make us anxious to click the buy button quickly without thinking it through. Adults are better at taking their time before buying than kids are. Not only have adults had more experience and practice, but their brains are more developed to control buying impulses. Most people believe that using these tricks on kids is unfair and unreasonable.

Pester Power

Once a child wants something, they will pester and beg their parents to buy it for them. Parents then buy the item to make their kids happy, sometimes without thinking enough about it. Pester power leads to more family stress and unnecessary purchases.

Packaging Tricks

We buy things if they look great and if we think they would be fun or good for us. That is why marketers spend a lot of money on design and use certain words and images that suggest the product is healthy even if it isn’t, like calling sugary flavors “fruit flavors.”

Using Slot Machine Reward Schedules

We will keep doing something if we are rewarded for it (get something for doing it). Video gaming companies know this. That is why they offer lots of rewards (like points, levels, weapons, and access to other players), so we keep playing and spending.

Psychology studies have shown that the best way to keep somebody playing is by giving them a variable ratio of reinforcement. This means the player is rewarded after an unpredictable number of responses (e.g., sometimes after three clicks, sometimes after one, and sometimes after twelve). There is no set pattern; it’s variable.

Slot machines are also set with a variable ratio of reinforcement because it is the best formula to keep people playing. Gaming companies apply a variable ratio of reinforcement within gaming design to keep players playing too. This can lead to losing control over the time we spend playing, which can lead to unhealthy screen use.

Too much reward can also overload your nervous system and stress you out without you realizing it. If you are cranky after gameplay, it may be that you’ve played too long or should opt for a mellower game.

Aspirational Marketing

Aspirational marketing refers to the technique of making the customer aspire, or wish, to be like the celebrity or influencer selling the product or to be happy like other customers seem to be.

Children’s brains are wired to copy people they look up to. This makes them vulnerable to this trick.

Parents must look out for ads that sell inappropriate things to young kids like sexy clothing, make-over products, rated-R movies, violent or sexual video games, music with inappropriate lyrics, processed and high-sugar, high-fat foods, and other things that aren’t good for kids.

What do psychologists have to say about marketers targeting kids?

In the last twenty years, people have been speaking out about concerns that young children are being specifically targeted by online marketers. In 2004, the American Psychological Association (APA) released a special task force report addressing these concerns.

They concluded that advertising to kids is unfair and promotes the use of harmful products to kids. They recommended that:

more research be conducted,
new policies be adopted like restricting advertising to children 8 years of age and under, and
developing media literacy programs starting in the third grade.

Other countries have responded to these concerns. For example, television marketing to children was banned in Norway and Sweden, junk-food ads were banned in Britain, and war toys were banned in Greece. America is far behind.

Parents and teachers are our children’s only real defense against sneaky online marketers. Although teaching kids about these tricks is a good start, it may place unfair expectations on children. Even knowing the tricks, they often still can’t stop themselves. They don’t have the brain development to do that yet.

We Can Make a Difference

Not only must parents adopt smart online management strategies, but they must also demand changes within the online world and advocate for new laws.

Recent changes in child nutrition are excellent examples of how change can start at home and lead to effective progress within the broader community. For example, due to parents determined to make positive changes in California elementary and middle schools, soft drinks were banned, and healthier food choices were offered.

We can impact what happens to our kids on the internet too! What do you think about formal advertising regulations? Should the government step in or is it the responsibility of the parents? How much regulation is too much? Is there enough regulation already?

If you are ready to reduce the marketing aimed at your kids, check out our Screen Safety Toolkit. Designed to offer tried-and-true links and descriptions of free and for-sale safety products at the device level, this course gives you what you need to increase online safety for your family.

Onward To More Awesome Parenting,

Tracy S. Bennett, Ph.D.
Mom, Clinical Psychologist, CSUCI Adjunct Faculty
GetKidsInternetSafe.com

The Psychological Mind Tricks of Online Neuromarketers

January 21, 2014 by Dr. Tracy Bennett

The commercialization of childhood refers to the fact that companies advertise to kids through websites, video games, and social media. These marketers use sneaky tricks that most adults aren’t even aware of! Before screen devices, we partly blocked advertising to kids since they don’t yet know how to defend themselves. Manipulating kids into thinking they MUST have a product for happiness is unfair. Convincing them that they need something can also make them anxious and feel bad about themselves. Advertising can be harmful to kids. Today’s GetKidsInternetSafe (GKIS) article was written to teach tweens and teens about the sneaky techniques that marketers use to get their money.

How an Experiment with a Rat Taught Me About Operant Conditioning

When I was at UCLA, I took a physiological psychology class. We learned how to study the effects of certain drugs on rats.

Here is how this worked.

Give the rat a drug so she doesn’t feel any pain.
Insert a wire into the pleasure center of her little rat brain.
Attach the wire to an electric source that is controlled by a lever in her cage that she presses with her little paws.
Count every time she pushes her lever to get a small electric charge to her brain’s pleasure center resulting in pleasurable feelings.

We collected two types of data; the number of times she pushed the lever when she was on her medication, and the number of times she pushed the lever when she wasn’t on any medication. If the medication enhanced pleasure, she would push the lever more. If it had no effect, she would push the same amount. If it decreased pleasure, she would push it less.

Because of the “happy inducing” medication assigned to my study group, we found that our rat pushed the lever more when she was on the medication. Not only did my happy rat teach us about the effects of the medication, but she also taught me about how behavior can be manipulated with medication and brain stimulation.

In psychology we call this operant conditioning, meaning the frequency of a behavior (like pushing a lever) is increased with reward and decreased with punishment.

Advertisers Manipulate Us with Operant Conditioning

To get us to buy things, marketers must convince us we need them. To do that, they bake in rewards for buying and punishments for not buying. Sometimes we realize that we are being manipulated, and sometimes we don’t.

Like the rat cage is designed for more lever pushes, advertisements are designed to coax a behavior from us – which is to buy, buy, buy.

Advertising to Children on Screen Devices

In 2006, the Federal Trade Commission reported that food and beverage companies spent 20 billion dollars on advertising targeting children. This often involved cross-promotion with movies or popular television programs.1 With screen devices (like game stations, computers, smartphones, tablets, and handheld game devices), we are exposed to more advertising than ever!

Advertising Techniques Used to Manipulate Kids

Internet marketing influences child brains like the electricity influenced the rat’s brain. Advertisements impact our neurology. That is why advertising designed to influence our brains is called neuromarketing. By persuading you with the company’s messaging (also called branding), you learn to like and trust that brand.

When kids visit websites or play games online, what sneaking advertising tricks might they expect?

Appealing characters that are designed to build brand loyalties at an early age
Banners and popups with lots of color and movement designed to attract and keep their attention
Featured games, puzzles, contests, toys, videos, and appealing activities that are branded to keep kids engaged for long periods of time. The longer you are on screen, the more exposure to the different marketing strategies
Promises of discounts and extra value to encourage pester power (the powerful influence of begging kids on parents’ wallets)
Action commands that create anxiety and spur buying behaviors like BUY NOW, GO NOW, SHOP NOW, PLAY NOW, LEARN MORE

Internet marketing is neither all-good nor all-bad. Sometimes we want to watch advertising content and learn about new things to buy. There is even advertising within online educational products (like the website you are on now). Without customer purchases, companies can’t afford to make cool things.

Young Kids Don’t Yet Have the Brain Abilities to Defend Against Marketing

The good news is that you have found GetKidsInternetSafe.com as a resource to start this educational process and ultimately better educate yourself and your children.

The bad news is that psychological research has demonstrated that, even when trained, children under eight years old lack the cognitive ability to view commercials defensively. In other words, young kids have a limited ability to understand the vocabulary, sentences, and inference drawing required for analyzing marketing schemes. For young kids, visual aspects of advertising dominate informational aspects. Their brains soak in the fun but fail to see the business side of screen time.

Although tweens and teens have the brain wiring to learn the tricks, even with parents helping young kids may still not be able to see them. For this reason, it is important that we limit child exposure to online advertisements and content. Parents must choose what their young kids watch wisely and only allow screen time for short periods of time. As kids grow older and onboard more reasoning abilities, they become less vulnerable to the tricks if they know what they are looking for!

Your Call to Action

Over the next week, I challenge you to change your focus while you are online. Instead of being a passive consumer (watching without thinking), keep an eye out for the marketing strategies embedded within each activity. Notice what tempts you and holds your attention and why. Notice that some strategies push for an immediate sale, while others coax a long-term trusting relationship with the brand to breed familiarity for ongoing sales. Share your observations and your opinions about what is fair play and what isn’t with your friends, parents, and teachers. Pay particular attention to strategies geared toward the adult viewer versus the child viewer.

Next week, I will share with you 6 powerful marketing techniques intended to groom children to be paying customers.

Onward To More Awesome Parenting,

Tracy S. Bennett, Ph.D.
Mom, Clinical Psychologist, CSUCI Adjunct Faculty
GetKidsInternetSafe.com

Anna Lappe asserts that parenting needs to be left to parents – not food marketers, in this TED talk.