Abstract
In an attention economy, understanding cognitive psychology gives an informer (or a disinformer) a major advantage in influencing opinion. What attracts attention? How do you hold attention? And how, over time, do you manipulate attention in ways that serve your purposes? These are key questions that we need to find answers to before we can fully grasp the role technology plays in influencing opinion.
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Notes
- 1.
This is based on the “Shannon–Weaver equation,” developed by Claude Shannon and Warren Weaver in The Mathematical Theory of Communication, Urbana, Ill.: University of Illinois Press (1949).
- 2.
Alan D. Baddeley, Human Memory: Theory and Practice, East Sussex: Psychology Press (1997), p. 29ff.
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Christof Koch and Patricia Kuhl, “Decoding ‘the Most Complex Object in the Universe’,” interview by Ira Flatow, Talk of the Nation, NPR, June 14, 2013, www.npr.org/2013/06/14/191614360/decoding-the-most-complex-object-in-the-universe .
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Alan D. Baddeley, Human Memory: Theory and Practice, East Sussex: Psychology Press (1997), p. 29ff.
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Jerome H. Barkow, Leda Cosmides, and John Tooby (eds), The Adapted Mind: Evolutionary Psychology and the Generation of Culture, New York, NY: Oxford University Press (1992).
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James Knierim, “Spinal Reflexes and Descending Motor Pathways,” in Neuroscience Online, University of Texas McGovern Medical School, accessed February 8, 2019, https://nba.uth.tmc.edu/neuroscience/s3/chapter02.html .
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David Huron, Sweet Anticipation: Music and the Psychology of Expectation, Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press (2006), p. 26.
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Patrick Colm Hogan, Cognitive Science, Literature, and the Arts, New York: Routledge (2003), 9–11.
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R. Plomp and J. M. Levelt, “Tonal Consonance and Critical Bandwidth,” in Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 37 (1965), pp. 548–60.
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Jennifer L. Monahan, Sheila T. Murphy, and R. B. Zajonc, “Subliminal Mere Exposure: Specific, General, and Diffuse Effects,” Psychological Science 11/6 (2000), 462–66.
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See, for example, Aniruddh D. Patel, Music, Language, and the Brain, Oxford: Oxford University Press (2008); Huron, Sweet Anticipation; Patrick N. Juslin and John A. Sloboda, Music and Emotion: Theory and Research, Oxford: Oxford University Press (2001); and the journal, Music Perception—just to name a few.
- 12.
Huron, Sweet Anticipation, pp. 53–55.
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Sasha Geffen, “The iPod May Be Dead, but Those Iconic Ads Still Shape the Way We See Music,” MTV News, published Mary 12, 2016, www.mtv.com/news/2879585/ipod-ads-in-music-culture/ .
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“2003: Apple Releases its Silhouette Campaign for iPod,” The Drum, March 31, 2016, www.thedrum.com/news/2016/03/31/2003-apple-releases-its-silhouette-campaign-ipod .
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Erin Richards, “Cognitive Efficiency Determines How Advertising Affects Your Brain,” in Science 2.0, December 9, 2008, www.science20.com/erin039s_spin/cognitive_efficiency_determines_how_advertising_affects_your_brain .
- 16.
Donald O. Hebb, The Organization of Behavior, New York: Wiley & Sons (1949).
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© 2019 Kris Shaffer
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Shaffer, K. (2019). Cog in the System. In: Data versus Democracy. Apress, Berkeley, CA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4842-4540-8_2
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