Читать книгу Figure It Out - Stephen P. Anderson - Страница 49

While the examples listed previously might also get cited as direct semantic or affective priming (something we’ll discuss next), we’re presenting these as metaphors, since they liken one thing to another. But what if there is no clear parallel? What if there’s no explicit correlation made between the focus topic and the metaphor brought to mind? Studies seem to suggest similar outcomes when the framing is unrelated to the decision being made. That is, simply having a particular concept suggested and in memory may influence an unrelated decision. In a 2009 study on this topic, psychologists Mark Landau, Daniel Sullivan, and Jeff Greenberg proposed that “metaphor is a mechanism by which motivational states in one conceptual domain can influence attitudes in a superficially unrelated domain.”⁷

In this study, participants were split into groups, and each group was asked to read an article about airborne bacteria. One group’s article described airborne bacteria as ubiquitous and harmful, while the other described airborne bacteria as ubiquitous and harmless. This article seeded an idea, that of airborne bacteria as either harmful or harmless.

Next, participants were asked to read one of two articles about U.S. domestic issues other than immigration. One of these articles contained a number of “country as body” metaphorical expressions: “After the Civil War, the United States experienced an unprecedented growth spurt, and is scurrying to create new laws that will give it a chance to digest the millions of innovations.” The other version of this article contained no such metaphors. “After the Civil War, the United States experienced an unprecedented period of innovation, and efforts are now underway to create new laws to control the millions of innovations.”

Finally, subjects completed a questionnaire about immigration and the minimum wage. As expected, subjects who read about the harmful effects of bacterial contamination along with an article that employed the country as body metaphor were more likely to hold negative attitudes regarding immigration.