http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Topic: Campaigning strategy en Mon, 20 Apr 2026 08:21:00 +0000 http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11875#post-136700 Thu, 12 Dec 2013 15:26:59 +0000 panyagua 136700@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Interesting article here:</p> <p><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/news/oliver-burkeman-s-blog/2013/dec/11/ironic-effects-sabotage-your-plans"><br /> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/news/oliver-burkeman-s-blog/2013/dec/11/ironic-effects-sabotage-your-plans" rel="nofollow">http://www.theguardian.com/news/oliver-burkeman-s-blog/2013/dec/11/ironic-effects-sabotage-your-plans</a><br /> </a></p> <p>Particularly this paragraph:</p> <p><em><br /> <strong>Awareness campaigns get forgotten by the people who need them most</strong></p> <p>"Motivated forgetting" is an especially galling species of ironic effect: when a message makes you feel vulnerable – for example, by reminding you of the ways in which your gender or ethnicity places you at a disadvantage – you're more likely to find ways, conscious or otherwise, to forget it, in order to retain a sense of self-control. In a <a href="http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/12/131210120721.htm">study</a> to be published in the Journal of Consumer Research, marketing experts found that students who were reminded of their university's poor performance were less likely to remember an advertisement offering a discount at the campus bookshop. "Consider an advertisement for breast cancer prevention," the researchers write. "If the ad makes … women’s vulnerability to the disease" salient in their minds, they could "feel threatened and exhibit defensive responses, such as decreased ad memory."</p> <p>In short: if you're trying to change behaviour or beliefs – your own, or other people's – don't assume that the most direct, vigorous or effortful route is necessarily the most effective one. The human mind is much, much more perverse and annoying than that.</em> </p>