Alas, almost every study that has been done on "Subliminal Seduction" has generated negative results. The famous Movie theatre experiment, for example, was totally uncontrolled -- and did Key mention that it was done during a heatwave, with broken air-conditioning in the theatre?
That wouldn't explain the rise in sales of popcorn, a hot food.
Moreover, tests of the "embedded sex objects" hypothesis don't pan out. It turns out that (a) people don't notice them unless they have been predisposed to (ie:"find the penis in the photo") and (b) whether or not there is an embed in the photo has no meaningful effect on the viewer.
Advertisers have found that such "artists jokes" as you call them are profit makers. Explain why almost 90-95% of all hard liquor ads show a glass filled with ice. Ice is a subliminal artist's wet dream; there is much to be airbrushed inside a piece of ice. Explain why advertisers will spend millions on an ad campaign in a magazine, where people only spend 1-2 sec MAXIMUM on that ad. These guys who run the businesses know what to spend the money on and where.
Basically, human beings are pattern recognition machines. We _love_ patterns so much that we tend to see them even when they aren't there
The idea of subliminallity is that you _don't_ see it when it _is_ there.
a big stimulus to you. So guys like Key, who are looking for patterns, will find them everywhere.
Key tried to go on Canadian TV awhile back with a program about his research. It was pulled after direct intervention from advertisers threatening to pull their ads if the show went on; the TV execs behaved predictibily. Why were they so scared of something which you see as a joke?
Deliberate embeds in advertising are almost without exception artists jokes.
That's right, advertising companies pay commercial artists dollars in lost profit to play jokes.
And most perceived embeds are simply random things about the image that our minds are organizing for us.
Yes, but on a conscious level organization takes place. Subconscious thought is different. Alex Reynolds