Even Gymnasium students are influenceable

For the Gamma module of the subject ‘Introduction to research’ we did an

experiment. For this experiment, we chose the subject hidden persuaders because
we found it a very interesting topic and because we wanted to find out more about
hidden persuaders. Hidden persuaders are especially used in marketing tactics.
Examples of hidden persuaders are: price, brand of a product and/or if the product is
in a lot of advertisements, etc. The fact that you can be influenced without knowing
that you are intrigued us.

For our literature research, we read four articles. The first two articles are of the
opinion that hidden persuaders can make you buy certain products or like them
more, especially when you’re not focused. The third and fourth article focus on the
persuasion of ads. They explain that ads manipulate a persons behaviour. However,
in the third article it’s said that ads manipulate you to buy a certain product, whilst in
the fourth article it is discussed that hidden persuaders influence your consumption
behaviour. We think that all the four articles combined give a good explanation of
what hidden persuaders are and what they do to consumers.

Our research question is: ‘To what extent does the price of a certain product
influence the pupils from the Gymnasium classes G1A and G1B (30 pupils) to like a
‘more expensive product’ better than an identical, ‘cheaper product’?’

We think that the price of a certain product will influence the students to prefer the
‘more expensive’ product.

We asked the pupils from G1A and G1B to do three experiments with us. We bought
crisps, chocolate and Ice Tea Green twice, from the same store and the same brand.
However, we told them that we bought crisps, chocolate and Ice Tea Green from two
different stores, and we also told them that one was more expensive than the other.
Every time we asked them to taste the two products, which were the same, and tell
us which one they liked better. We explained to them that we were doing an
experiment to find out if they could taste the difference between two of the same
products with a different brand, so that they wouldn’t focus on what we were actually
investigating.

We put the results of our

experiment in a bar chart. When
we look at the results, we can
see that in the experiment with
the crisps (blue), 17 people liked
 the cheaper crisps better, whereas 11 people prefered the more expensive ones. In
the experiment with the chocolate (orange), it can be seen that 9 people liked the
cheaper chocolate better, while 17 people liked the more expensive one better. And
finally, in the last experiment with the Ice Tea Green (yellow), it is shown that 13
people liked the cheaper product better, and that 17 people liked the more expensive
product better.

Note: we did not include the pupils who did not taste a difference, and therefore
passed the ‘test’, in the results.

It can be concluded that there is no clear pattern in preference of the crisps,

chocolate and Ice Tea Green by the students from the classes G1A and G1B.
However, it can be said that the majority of the students prefered the cheaper crisps,
the more expensive chocolate and the more expensive Ice Tea Green. Therefore,
our hypothesis is partly correct but not completely.

In the future, we could use more test persons, and also more hidden persuaders. For
example, now we only used the price, but in the future we could also use the bag of
the crisps, and see if the appearance of the bags influences thee students’ choices
more. We could also tell the people that it is okay to not choose either product, since
our presence might have been a ‘hidden persuader’ which caused the students to
choose one of the two products when they actually did not taste a difference.

By Chiara Alvaro and Lotte Segers

G3B

List of sources

1. Bermeitinger, C., Goelz, R., Johr, N., Neumann, M., H. Ecker, U.K., Doerr, R. (2008);
​ ssoar.info -​The hidden persuaders break into the tired brain. consulted: 30-03-2018
https://www.ssoar.info/ssoar/bitstream/handle/document/29133/ssoar-jexpsocpsychol
-2009-2-bermeitinger_et_al-the_hidden_persuaders_break_into.pdf?sequence=1
2. Goode, A. (year of publication unknown); cogresearch.com - ​The role of ad memory
in ad persuasion - rethinking the hidden persuaders. consulted: 06-04-2018
http://www.cogresearch.com/files/ijmr_final_a_goode.pdf
3. Hodgson, G.M. (2002); uhra.herts.ac.uk - ​The Hidden Persuaders: Institutions and
Individuals in Economic Theory. consulted: 30-03-2018
http://uhra.herts.ac.uk/bitstream/handle/2299/673/900721.pdf?sequence=1Milner
4. Wansink, B. (2010); meta-systems.eu - ​From mindless eating to mindlessly eating
better. consulted: 06-04-2018
http://www.meta-systems.eu/nickbrown/duplication/SectionB/(Annotated)%20Wansin
k%20-%202010%20-%20From%20mindless%20eating%20to%20mindlessly%20eati
ng%20better.pdf