How Unconscious Thought and Perception Affect Our Every Waking Moment [Preview]
Unconscious impulses and desires impel what we think and do in ways Freud never dreamed of
In Brief
- Decision making often occurs without people giving much conscious thought to how they vote, what they buy, where they go on vacation or the way they negotiate a myriad of other life choices.
- Unconscious processes underlie the way we deliberate and plan our lives—and for good reason. Automatic judgments, for one, are essential for dodging an oncoming car or bus.
- Behaviors governed by the unconscious go beyond looking both ways at the corner. Embedded attitudes below the level of awareness shape many of our attitudes toward others.
- Sigmund Freud meditated on the meaning of the unconscious throughout his career. These newer studies provide a more pragmatic perspective on how we relate to a boss or spouse.
When psychologists try to understand the way our mind works, they frequently come to a conclusion that may seem startling: people often make decisions without having given them much thought—or, more precisely, before they have thought about them consciously. When we decide how to vote, what to buy, where to go on vacation and myriad other things, unconscious thoughts that we are not even aware of typically play a big role. Research has recently brought to light just how profoundly our unconscious mind shapes our day-to-day interactions.
One of the best-known studies to illustrate the power of the unconscious focused on the process of deciding whether a candidate was fit to hold public office. A group of mock voters were given a split second to inspect portrait photographs from the Internet of U.S. gubernatorial and senatorial candidates from states other than where the voters lived. Then, based on their fleeting glimpses of each portrait, they were asked to judge the candidates. Remarkably, the straw poll served as an accurate proxy for the later choices of actual voters in those states. Competency ratings based on seeing the candidates' faces for less time than it takes to blink an eye predicted the outcome of two out of three elections.
One of the best-known studies to illustrate the power of the unconscious focused on the process of deciding whether a candidate was fit to hold public office. A group of mock voters were given a split second to inspect portrait photographs from the Internet of U.S. gubernatorial and senatorial candidates from states other than where the voters lived. Then, based on their fleeting glimpses of each portrait, they were asked to judge the candidates. Remarkably, the straw poll served as an accurate proxy for the later choices of actual voters in those states. Competency ratings based on seeing the candidates' faces for less time than it takes to blink an eye predicted the outcome of two out of three elections.
