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Researchers find inverse correlation between advertising and life satisfaction
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Re: Researchers find inverse correlation between advertising and life satisfaction
#62This reminds me of an anecdote a friend told me: This friend dedicates his time in going to very rural areas/towns here in Mexico to implement government programs. At some point in the past he got to a town were the cantina had just gotten the only TV in town... apparently people in the town were generally happy, and they had everything they needed... so in their view they were not poor. But once they started watchin…
Another example, Apartheid South Africa got TV in 1976, six months later the riots started, coincidence? I think as soon as black people in South Africa could see how black people in America lived, they truly realized how bad they had it. Here it contributed to the undoing of an unjust government, so it's not always a force for evil. I think the most dangerous thing to North Korea is western media. I know the South K…
anti-apartheid struggle started way earlier though.
TV may have helped break some of the propaganda of the government
Re: Researchers find inverse correlation between advertising and life satisfaction
#63This reminds me of an anecdote a friend told me: This friend dedicates his time in going to very rural areas/towns here in Mexico to implement government programs. At some point in the past he got to a town were the cantina had just gotten the only TV in town... apparently people in the town were generally happy, and they had everything they needed... so in their view they were not poor. But once they started watchin…
That raises profound and fascinating philosophical questions about the nature of knowledge and happiness. I wonder how many of those people would choose to forego the knowledge of what they don't have if it meant they would be happy again. On the other hand, is that even a meaningful question to ask, given it's not possible?
Which of course leads to the ethical question: is it right for people to live in ignorance if it makes them happy, it it's not their choice? Is it fundamentally better for people to be happy rather than aware of massive inequality (up to and including significant poverty)? How much would be appropriate to hide, for how much additional happiness? Is it better in the long run for some to be unhappy if it brings attention to inequality?
I don't have any of those answers, but they're interesting and challenging questions.
Re: Researchers find inverse correlation between advertising and life satisfaction
#64Isn't that the primary goal of most advertising? To create a dissatisfaction in people in such a way that they're driven to buy your product in an attempt to fill that void?
That question is addressed in the article: "Their line is that advertising is trying to expose the public to new and exciting things to buy, and their task is to simply provide information, and in that way they raise human well-being. But the alternative argument, which goes back to Thorstein Veblen and others, is that exposing people to a lot of advertising raises their aspirations—and makes them feel that their own…
I guess I just think it's funny that we need scientific studies for blatantly disingenuous claims: "their task is to simply provide information and in that way they raise human well-being."
It's like doing a scientific study on the common claim of advertisers that "the internet would not exist without advertising".
Re: Researchers find inverse correlation between advertising and life satisfaction
#65Isn't that the primary goal of most advertising? To create a dissatisfaction in people in such a way that they're driven to buy your product in an attempt to fill that void?
That question is addressed in the article: "Their line is that advertising is trying to expose the public to new and exciting things to buy, and their task is to simply provide information, and in that way they raise human well-being. But the alternative argument, which goes back to Thorstein Veblen and others, is that exposing people to a lot of advertising raises their aspirations—and makes them feel that their own…
> their task is to simply provide information
Hilarious, when advertisements provide so incredibly little information, except how the product looks when held by attractive people, or driven by them along empty roads. And what little information they do provide, comes in tiny font after an asterisk at the bottom of the ad, that they were legally forced to include.
Re: Researchers find inverse correlation between advertising and life satisfaction
#66I'm gonna take the contrarian viewpoint here. Full disclosure: I'm in advertising. The researcher states that increasing "aspiration" (their term) leads to dissatisfaction and more unhappiness. Sure! But aspiration is also why we invented the wheel, harnessed fire, founded fancy schools like Harvard, try to be good parents, etc. I don't disagree that ambition and aspiration can make a person unhappy. But it's also wh…
I feel slightly insulted by your point of view. You seem to be saying that advertising is like medicine, it might taste bad but it will end up being good for me in the end. Short of moving to a cabin in the woods, there is no way to actually escape advertising if I choose. And even limiting advertising takes a lot of effort.
I'm not just talking about ads on web pages - it's in movies, TV, on the sides of buildings, on the back of every car on the road, on every radio station, in every store, at every gas station, every few hundred yards on every interstate, every bus stop, every telephone pole, in every magazine and news paper.
I don't want to take this medicine, please stop shoving it down my throat. I'm perfectly happy without all of these healthy "aspirations" to guide me in my life.
Re: Researchers find inverse correlation between advertising and life satisfaction
#67Write up of methodology & results: https://www.andrewoswald.com/docs/AdvertisingMicheletal2019E...
Re: Researchers find inverse correlation between advertising and life satisfaction
#68I'm gonna take the contrarian viewpoint here. Full disclosure: I'm in advertising. The researcher states that increasing "aspiration" (their term) leads to dissatisfaction and more unhappiness. Sure! But aspiration is also why we invented the wheel, harnessed fire, founded fancy schools like Harvard, try to be good parents, etc. I don't disagree that ambition and aspiration can make a person unhappy. But it's also wh…
> But aspiration is also why we invented the wheel, harnessed fire, founded fancy schools like Harvard, try to be good parents, etc. Excluding fancy schools (which I believe aren't exactly a good thing), none of those things were inspired by "aspiration" in the sense being used here. They were inspired by genuine need. > I consider that a good thing even if it comes at the cost of a decrease in personal happiness. We…
> We could not possible disagree more. I think it is straight-up immoral for anyone to intentionally make another's life worse in order to sell them stuff.
I'm not sure we disagree, actually. I think you may be misunderstanding my meaning.
When I tell you about a product, a number of things are happening:
1. If I'm successful in getting you to want the product, I've created (or emphasized an existing) dissatisfaction. That's not good. But:
2. I've given you the knowledge of a solution to your problem. Depending on the problem at hand, the solution might improve your health, extend your life, help you earn more money, be a better parent, donate to a charity, etc.
So I think if you want to stand in judgment of the morality of advertising, it has to be done on a case by case basis, and you have to weigh all the pros and cons.
I'll give you an example of a type of advertising that will clearly decrease your happiness but is still a net positive. (Impossible, right?)
Take a look at any ad for any charity. Those ads make your life worse by telling you how miserable things are for some group of people or animals or some other cause. And even if you "buy" what the ads are selling (i.e. you give them money), you're still going to feel like garbage about their cause. And yet, I'm willing to bet you wouldn't consider those ads to be evil, would you?
It's an extreme example, but it illustrates my point: you have to consider more than just happiness.
Here's a more extreme example: If all I cared about was making people happy, I'd sell heroin. Heroin feels awesome. Heroin makes people happy. It also destroys their lives in the process. Some addicts manage to be happy all the way to their death bed.
So happiness is not the end-all-be-all measurement of what is good and what is bad. It's definitely A measurement. I'm not discounting it. I'm just saying there are other things to consider as well, and I don't personally consider it the #1 most important measurement. (It's probably in my top 5.)
Re: Researchers find inverse correlation between advertising and life satisfaction
#69Isn't that the primary goal of most advertising? To create a dissatisfaction in people in such a way that they're driven to buy your product in an attempt to fill that void?
Advertising used to be about listing the benefits of the product. Edward Bernays turned that on its head and made it about molding the public's psyche to make them see material goods as a form of identity, i.e. independent women who exercise their right to vote demonstrate their independence by publicly smoking cigarettes. > Bernays touted the idea that the "masses" are driven by factors outside their conscious under…
And here lies the rotten and corrupted core of modern advertising.
Re: Researchers find inverse correlation between advertising and life satisfaction
#70This reminds me of an anecdote a friend told me: This friend dedicates his time in going to very rural areas/towns here in Mexico to implement government programs. At some point in the past he got to a town were the cantina had just gotten the only TV in town... apparently people in the town were generally happy, and they had everything they needed... so in their view they were not poor. But once they started watchin…
You can’t put it back in the cage - just like working in the movie industry changes the way you look at movies, advertising changes the way you feel in society.