Why You Really Do Prefer Coke or Pepsi
Guess what? Your passionate preference for Coke or Pepsi is in your brain, not just your taste buds. Baylor University researchers gave 67 volunteers taste tests of Coke and Pepsi, and brain scans showed that when they knew what they were drinking it not only affected their preference, but also activated memory-related brain regions that recall cultural influences. Academic-speak translation: Product branding and advertising work.
Think political advertising. Think political conventions. think Nuremberg rallies. Think Karl Rove. Think Josef Goebbels.
Think of why it is that so many people are willing to vote for Bush and radical Republicans even though it is against virtually all of their obvious economic and social self-interests. Think of why so few people can articulate why they prefer one candidate over another.
Lead study author Samuel McClure, who has left Baylor and is now a professor at Princeton University, said in a news release announcing the study findings that our choice for Coke or Pepsi is affected by our perception because "there are visual images and marketing messages that have insinuated themselves into the nervous systems of humans that consume the drinks." That's right. Science says advertising has worked its way into our nervous systems. While scientists have long suspected that cultural messages do have an impact on taste perception, they did not know until now that there was a neurological component as well.
Political advertising is not just "free speech," with the implication that it is part of a rational and logical exchange of ideas as protected by the Constitution's First Amendment, which therefore permits the obscene fundraising that is the root of our system's corruption. You think the millions spent on honing messages in focus groups is simply just defining a dispassionate argument? It's more akin to drug-testing and probably should be regulated (ha!) by the FDA. Corporations spend billions to introduce political and consumer messages which actually alter your brain to to their bidding.
The team chose a Coke vs. Pepsi test for two reasons. First, there is a growing obesity crisis in the United States, and sugary soft drinks are one of the leading causes. In addition, even though Coke and Pepsi are nearly identical chemically and physically, people often have a very strong preference for one or the other, making them ideal for a rigorous scientific study. Interestingly, the researchers found there was no influence of brand knowledge for Pepsi, but when it came to Coke, there was a dramatic effect of the Coke label on behavioral preference. The brand knowledge of Coke influenced their preference and activated specific areas of the brain, including the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and the hippocampus, both of which are implicated in modifying behavior based on emotion.
Bombardment by political messages is CHANGING YOUR BRAIN! This makes the wing-nut arguments against water fluoridation in the 60's and 70's look like child's play. Allowing corporations to spend billions influencing our political and consumer choices is like letting the local crack dealer adulterate your food, and then wondering why you develop an addiction.
The conclusion: Two separate brain systems in the prefrontal cortex--one involving taste and one recalling cultural influence--interact to determine our preferences. And you thought you just liked the taste! The study findings were published in the journal Neuron.
Any real electoral reform needs to eliminate the use of Madison Avenue style advertising and return political discourse to the reality-based world. There have already been scandals over subliminal messages in political ads. Remember the RATS ad from the 2000 election?
http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/09/13/bush.ad/
Any attempts to contain and eliminate corruption in our political system requires that the fundraising for this advertising be eliminated by substituting free network time for candidates, and more "rational" discussion of the candidates and issues in debate formats, not 30 second emotional flashbombs that literally alter your brain.
I know I sound like I'm wearing tinfoil on my head at the moment. But this is exactly the kind of information more people need to be at least made aware so they can consider it. Talking about fixing our political system by tinkering at the margins is all well and good. But I think we also need to understand that there are fundamentally much more profound forces at work than paper trails for electronic balloting will address.
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