He had made up the results to drum up business for his ad agency. The only result? His “eat popcorn” message seemed to make Senator Charles Potter want a hot dog.Īs it turns out, Vicary’s claims were a hoax. Vicary was even asked to test the messages before the Federal Communications Commission ( FCC) and Congress.
While Vicary just wanted to make a quick buck, some were scared that the technique could be used for brainwashing. Vicary claimed that popcorn sales at the theater went up 18%, while Coke sales shot up 57%.
#Subliminal synonym movie
In 1957, an ad man named James Vicary claimed he could increase concession sales at movie theaters by flashing messages like “Drink Coca Cola” or “Eat Popcorn” for a frame at a time during a movie.
It continued to be a subject of interest to psychologists into the 1950s.Īs interesting as the topic may have been for psychologists, it proved even more intriguing to advertisers who saw an opportunity in influencing behavior for fun and profit. Then in the 1940s, psychologists began to consider external subliminal stimuli, wondering if things unnoticed consciously by a subject may still affect their behavior.
Subliminal comes from the Latin sub limen, literally “below the threshold,” in this case meaning below the threshold of conscious awareness.įast forward to the early 1900s when a theology journal spoke of subconscious thought as “subliminal mentation.”
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