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Available -,, online at www.sciencedirect.com Journal of •;;- ScienceDirect CONSUMERPSYCHOLOGY

ELSEVIER Journal of Consumer Psychology 21 (2011) 49- 56

Motivating consumer behavior by subliminal conditioning in the absence of basic needs: Striking even while the iron is cold

Martijn Veltkamp a,*, Ruud Custers b, Henk Aarts b

a University ofTwente, Department of Marketing Communication and Consumer Psychology, PO Box 217, 7500AE Enschede, The Netherlands b Utrecht University, Department of Social Psychology, PO Box 80140, 3508 TC, Utrecht, The Netherlands

Received 30 December 2009; revised 25 August 20 IO; accepted 21 September 20 I0 Available online 15 October 2010

Abstract

Previous research suggests that priming of behavioral concepts (e.g., drinking water) motivates consumers outside conscious awareness, but only if primes match a current need (e.g., fluid deprivation). The present article reports two studies testing whether subliminal conditioning (subliminally priming a behavioral concept and linking it to positive affect) can motivate such need-related behaviors even in the absence of deprivation. Both studies showed an interaction effect: Motivation to drink water increased with fluid deprivation, and subliminally conditioning drinking water more positive only motivated drinking in the absence of deprivation. Furthermore, Study 2 suggests that motivation resulting from conditioning is more specific than following deprivation, as only the latter can be reduced by pursuing alternative behaviors (i.e., eating high- liquid foods). Thus, although traditionally the motivation for need-related behaviors is thought to depend on deprivation, this research shows subliminal conditioning can motivate consumers as if they were deprived. © 2010 Society for Consumer Psychology. Published by Elsevier lnc. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Deprivation; Conditioning; Motivation; Subliminal persuasion; Priming

An important question in consumer psychology is to understand how environmental cues such as commercials, role models or slogans can motivate consumers to perform specific behaviors such as buying a particular brand of coke or eating a healthy sandwich. The question of whether such environmental cues can also motivate consumers outside their conscious awareness has interested psychologists to an equal – if not larger – degree. Probably the most famous research example addressing this question is that of James Vicary. He claimed already in the fifties of the last century that priming "drink Coke" and "eat popcorn" on a cinema screen outside visitors' awareness (i.e., subliminally) increased their motivation to buy and consume these products.

Although Vicary's claims were later exposed as a publicity hoax, recent experimental studies have found support for the

* Corresponding author. Fax: +31 534894259. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (M. Veltkamp), [email protected]

(R. Custers), [email protected] (H. Aarts).

effect of subliminal priming on consumer behavior. Karremans and colleagues found that subliminally priming people with the brand name of a thirst-quenching beverage increased people's choice for that beverage (Karremans, Stroebe, & Claus, 2006), but only when people were thirsty. Strahan, Spencer, and Zanna (2002) found that subliminally priming people simply with words related to drinking also increased fluid consumption in a taste task, but again only if participants were fluid deprived. Finally, Bermeitinger et al. (2009) showed that presenting people with the brand name of a dextrose pill motivated people's intake of those pills, but only for people who were tired and hence needed an energy boost. These studies suggest that Vicary's ideas were partly right after all. Subliminally priming consumers with behaviors related to eating or drinking does influence their consumption, but only if people are already deprived. Priming effects on consumption, then, seem to be dependent on basic needs such as hunger and thirst. Indeed, Strahan et al. (2002) concluded that when it comes to motivating consumption by means of subliminal primes, one needs to strike while the iron is hot.

1057-7408/$ – see front matter© 2010 Society for Consumer Psychology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi: 10.1016/j.jcps.2010.09.01 I

50 M. Veltkamp el al. I Journal o/Con,umer P.1ycJzology 21 (201 I) 49–56

However, for other types of behavior, deprivation does not seem to be required for priming effects to occur. Priming people with achievement has been found to increase performance and persistence ofbehavior (Bargh, Gollwitzer, Lee Chai, Barndollar, & Trotschel, 2001), even when primes are presented subliminally (Hart & Albarracin, 2009). In the consumer domain, subliminally priming retail brands associated with a thrift goal (i.e., Wal-Mart) was found to make consumers more motivated to behave in accordance with this goal; they preferred lower-priced products over more prestigious (and expensive) alternatives (Chartrand, Huber, Shiv, & Tanner, 2008). Similarly, Brasel and Gips (2011) showed that a "Red Bull" prime, a brand associated with speed and risk taking, motivated participants to go as fast as possible and take more risks in a racing game. Apparently, behaviors such as achieving or saving money motivate behavior when primed because they are desired in their own right (for an overview, see, e.g., Dijksterhuis, Chartrand, & Aart<;, 2007).

Recently, it has been argued that the reason that primed goals affect motivation out<;ide of awareness is that goals are represented in people's minds as desirable and that priming such goals activates a positive affective tag that functions as a reward signal (Custers & Aarts, 2010). As a result, subliminally priming a behavior together with positive affect motivates people to engage in that behavior, effectively creating a behavioral goal by means of subliminal conditioning (Aarts, Custers, & Marien, 2008; Custers & Aarts, 2005). This suggests that creating associations between behavior and positive affect through conditioning may actually motivate consumption of articles that are usually motivated by deprivation (e.g., drinks or food), even in the absence of actual deprivation, and out<;ide conscious awareness. In the present paper, we test this intriguing hypothesis. That is, we investigate the effect of subliminal conditioning on consumption and investigate how these effects may differ from those of deprivation.

Differences and similarities between motivation resulting from deprivation and subliminal conditioning

It is widely known that motivation to obtain resources crucial for survival (e.g., fluid, food, or social contact) fluctuates with deprivation. While motivation is high when people are deprived, it is eliminated when resources arc replenished (McDougall, l 908; Murray, 1938; see also Pittman & Zeigler, 2007). This mechanism is to a large extent the result of learning. It is assumed that very early in childhood, people learn that performing a specific behavior (e.g., drinking) is rewarding given that there is a state of deprivation (incentive theory, e.g., Berridge, 2007; Toates, 1986; Veltkamp, Aarts, & Custers, 2009), but not when such deprivation is absent. This does not mean that determining whether performing this behavior is rewarding requires much elaboration. Seibt, Hafner, and Deutsch (2007), for instance, demonstrated that the automatic affective reactions to food become more positive with people's level of deprivation. Hence, the reward value of objects or actions that can lift the state of deprivation (e.g., eating bread, drinking coke) becomes more positive with deprivation and returns to zero after resources are replenished and the deprivation is lifted. The reward value of actions that

are crucial for the well-being of an individual is therefore shaped by deprivation through a learned relation between deprivation and reward value. Hence, motivation for behaviors that lift a state of deprivation increase or diminish with the level of deprivation. Not surprisingly then, this is exactly what is found in studies where behaviors and products that are related to deprivation are subliminally primed (Bcrmeitinger et al., 2009; Karremans et al., 2006; Strahan et al., 2002; Veltkamp, Aarts, & Custers, 2008a).

Such fluctuations in motivation depending on deprivation are not expected, though, when motivation results from subliminal conditioning. According to the literature on evaluative conditioning (for an overview, see De Houwer, Thomas, & Baeyens, 2001 ), merely pairing a to be conditioned stimulus (CS) with positive or negative stimuli (US) causes changes in the valence of the CS. This can also motivate behavior. For example, subliminally co-activating an originally neutral behavior like doing puzzles with positively valenced words has been shown to increase the motivation for that specific behavior outside awareness: Participants were found to be more eager to actually perform puzzles (Custers & Aarts, 2005) and to obtain puzzles (Veltkamp, Aarts, & Custers, 2008b). These changes in the valence of the CS are relatively stable over time. For instance, this type of conditioning has been found to be highly resistant to extinction, in that presenting the CS without the US after conditioning does not eliminate the conditioning effects (De Houwer et al., 200 l ). Hence, it is expected that the motivating effects of subliminal conditioning on behavior (Custers & Aarts, 2005; Aarts et al., 2008) would be insensitive to changes in deprivation, and create a long-lasting link between deprivation-related beha- viors ( e.g., drinking) and positive affect. Thus, consumers should be motivated to perform such behaviors following subliminal conditioning even in the absence of deprivation. This idea was tested in Study 1.

If subliminal conditioning is able to motivate behavior when deprivation is low, an important question becomes what happens if deprivation is high during conditioning. Would subliminal conditioning be redundant for people who are deprived? A possible answer to this question can be found when one considers the hierarchical structures in which behavior is organized. Previous research suggests that many behaviors are part of goal structures (Aart<; & Dijksterhuis, 2000; Kruglanski et aL, 2002), where multiple lower-order goals are related to attaining one higher-order goal. According to this view, reducing deprivation (e.g., thirst) could be seen as a higher-order goal that can in theory be attained by various means (e.g., drinking a beverage, eating cucumber). How- ever, creating an association between drinking and positive affect would result in a lower-order goal that could only be fulfilled by means of drinking. Such a motivation, then, would be very specific and pertain directly to the behavior and not to a higher-order goal.

Taken together, the hierarchy structure of goals perspective suggest<; that subliminal conditioning is effective for high deprived individuals as well, because it creates motivation on a more specific behavioral level. These effects should become apparent if people are allowed to attain the higher-order goal (i.e., reducing deprivation) without performing the focal behavior

51 M Veltkamp et al. I Journal of Consumer Psychology 21 (201 I) 49-56

(e.g., quenching thirst by means of eating ra1her than drinking). This should not have an effect on 1he motivation to attain 1he focal behavior following subliminal conditioning but should diminish motivation for that behavior wi1hout such a condition- ing procedure. This idea will be tested in Study 2.

The present research

In the present paper, we report two studies 1hat aimed to examine 1he combined effects of deprivation and conditioning for the behavior of drinking water. Drinking water was selected as it is an effective way to reduce fluid deprivation and fluid is clearly an essential resource of which people should not become too deprived. However, apart from being motivated by deprivation, people can, in principle, also be motivated to drink water because it is rewarding in itself. Furthermore, we chose a relatively neutrally tasting product (water) of which it could be expected that attaching it to positive affect would enhance it<; positivity ra1her 1han a specific soda or brand which may already be positive for participants to begin wi1h (cf. Gibson, 2008).

Study I tested whether co-activating the subliminally primed behavior representation of drinking with neutral affect would result in drinking motivation depending on fluid deprivation, but would be high irrespective of deprivation if the representation was conditioned to positive affect. Study 2 focused on the behavioral specificity of participant<;· motiva- tion, by testing for high fluid-deprived individuals whether replenishing fluid deprivation by means of eating cucumber would diminish drinking motivation if 'drinking' was co- activated with neutral affect, but would not affect drinking motivation if'drinking' was conditioned to positive affect

Study 1

This study tested the idea that whereas the motivation to drink following subliminal priming should normally depend on the deprivation of fluids, conditioning the mental repre- sentation of drinking to positive affect can motivate drinking behavior in the absence of actual deprivation. Deprivation was manipulated by asking participants to eat crackers in an alleged consumer product task. In actuality, consuming crackers was expected to exacerbate participants' need for fluid (cf. StTahan et al., 2002) and thus was part of the deprivation manipulation. Next, half of the participants were allowed to drink water (hence, the low deprivation condition). Participants then engaged in a conditioning task where drinking water was subliminally primed and paired with neutral or positive affect. Importantly, the accessibility of the drinking represen- tation thus was equal for all participants. Finally, to assess changes in behavior, we unobtrusively measured water consumption as part of a product-comparison task. In line with earlier work (e.g., Strahan et al., 2002; Veltkamp et al., 2008a), it was expected that water intake would increase with fluid deprivation. Importantly, however, positively condition- ing "drinking" would enhance water intake when fluid deprivation is relatively low.

Method

Participants and design Sixty-five undergraduates participated in the experiment in

exchange for a small fee. This study used a 2 (deprivation: low vs. high) x 2 ( conditioning: neutral vs. positive) between- participant design.

Procedure To conceal the real purpose of the study, the study was

announced as an experiment on perception and consumer product judgment. The experiment was run in a room containing three tables separated by large screens. Thus, in each part of the experimental session participants could see only their own table.

Deprivation manipulation Participant<; started with an alleged product-comparison

task where they had to eat two different crackers and filled out a short questionnaire to rate different aspects of the crackers (e.g., shape). Next, participants in the low deprivation condition were provided with an empty glass and a jug filled wi1h water, allowing 1hem to take water before proceeding to the next part of the experiment. In the high deprivation condition, participant<; were not provided with the drinking gear, and hence did not quench 1heir thirst.

Pilot work Prior to the experiment, we conducted a pilot test to assess

the effects of our tTeatment on self-reported thirst. Thirty-one undergraduates (drawn from a different student population) were assigned randomly to either the low or high deprivation condition. After a I 0-minute filler task, they indicated on a I 0- point scale (ranging from I, not at all, to 10, very much) how thirsty they felt at that moment. An ANOV A revealed a significant effect of the deprivation manipulation on ratings of thirst, F(l,30)=24.04,p<.001, ,,,2=.45. The reported level of thirst was significantly higher in the high deprivation (M= 6.50, SD= .43) than in 1he low deprivation (M=3.65, SD=.39) condition. Thus, the crackers without water consumption treatment (high fluid deprivation) increased rated 1hirst over 10 minutes post-ingestion.

Conditioning manipulation Next, participants were seated behind a computer and learned

1hat 1hey wou Id do a "dot-detection tac;k" where all kinds of words would be presented on the screen, sometimes followed by dots presented briefly above or below these words. Their task was to indicate whe1her they had seen a dot or not. In actuality, in this task drinking words were subliminally primed and paired with either positive or neutral affective words (for a similar procedure, see e.g., Aarts, Custers, & Holland, 2007; Custers & Aarts, 2005). Because the focal behavior was drinking a glass of water, we used 1he following three drinking words: drinking, glass, and water. These words were each paired with either nine positive words (good, nice, fun, love, great, smile, friend, pleasant, peace) or nine neutral words (1hus, fur1hermore, when, although, therefore, however, such, also, because; taken from Custers & Aartc;, 2005).