Having the right guidelines and values in life is worthy of respect. Feeling guilty about your unsightly actions is completely natural. But how corporations can play on our conscience and how guilt affects the way we spend money, let’s figure it out together.
“I can’t stand my uncle, he jokes nasty and is generally an unpleasant person,” Anna admits. – She did not hide her dislike, she always shunned him at the holidays. And for the defense of the diploma, he unexpectedly gave me money. I have such a mixed feeling … As if some kind of awkwardness and disgust. I didn’t touch the envelope for a long time, in the end I decided to spend it on a gift for dad. Something useful, but not for yourself.
“I worked in an advertising agency, and some projects gave me a feeling of guilt – for example, they came up with a lot of videos and actions to advertise beer, but this is alcohol propaganda, and I have drunken friends,” says Lera. – When it was completely unpleasant from this contradiction between work and my own convictions, I transferred money to a dog shelter. It became easier – at least some benefit to the world.
“I watched a video about the slave labor of children in Vietnam, and I was blocked,” writes Marina. “Sometimes you buy all kinds of clothes, and then you see the “Made in Vietnam” tag, and rage rolls over brands, corporations that use slave labor. And it turns out that I am an accomplice, since I buy from them? .. “
“Ten years ago I read somewhere that one of the brands does not test their creams on animals,” Olga shares. “I immediately threw out all the others, and now I have all their cosmetics, from shampoo to lipstick.”
Rebalancing
The feeling of guilt is a convenient hook, which can be “pulled” not only by the surrounding people-manipulators, but also by brands. Yes, and we ourselves sometimes, driven by pangs of conscience, make purchases that we would not make in a different situation.
In some cases, the end justifies the means. For example, there is an impressive poster for drivers: a child car seat and a wheelchair are depicted next to it, and the slogan suggests thinking about where to put the child. Playing with guilt? And how! The right message is to take care of the safety of the kids? Undoubtedly!
The property of the psyche is to focus more on negative events and news than on pleasant ones. Guilt is an even more intense experience that threatens a positive sense of self. We are so arranged that we want to see ourselves as positive heroes rather than negative ones.
Few people, having committed an ugly act, will honestly say to themselves: “I am a mean person and I just like to do nasty things to others.” As a rule, he will find an excuse and an external reason for his actions. Therefore, having done something really bad, for which we condemn ourselves, we experience guilt and try to compensate for it.
In the case when the damage itself cannot be compensated for the victim, we seem to restore the internal balance by doing something good for other people. This is played by neuromarketers, setting traps for buyers, as well as larger players.
Taking advantage of the benefits of civilization, do you feel guilty for deforestation and environmental problems? Then buy our super safe renewable energy sources. And the companies will try to keep silent about the fact that for their production the slave labor of underage workers in the Congo was used to mine, say, cobalt.
Money does not smell?
If we feel that we have received money undeservedly or feel guilty about it, this can affect how we spend it, writes cognitive psychologist Matt Johnson. The internal conflict caused by the contradiction between receiving a reward (money) and one’s own “bad” act (for example, participating in alcohol propaganda while realizing the problem of people’s dependence on it) is a typical cognitive dissonance.
A healthy way to regain inner balance is compensation. Therefore, a person was ready to spend part of the salary received for a beer commercial for charity. And the gift of an unpleasant relative is for the health of the father. Conversely, if we perceive money as honestly earned or received from someone we like, then we will readily spend it on our own pleasures.
Why do we need to know this?
Obviously, much rests on value. They determine for what actions a person will feel guilty. But you can find your own approach to each consumer, everyone has weaknesses, connoisseurs of the human psyche who work for corporations understand this well.
It is useful for all of us to know about ourselves what mechanisms sometimes control us in order to consciously use them to restore peace of mind and understand what games neuromarketers are playing with us.