Are you influenced by television advertising?

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This topic came up in another thread about attractive people on dating sites. I speculated that the very attractive people are simply "plants" used to make people believe that they can date someone very attractive if they were to use that particular dating web site.

I then mentioned how this seems no different than including attractive women (and men) in beer commercials. To make people believe that they will get to associate with attractive women (or men) if they drink "Brand X".

This makes me wondered if television advertising actually “works” on Aspies (and the degree to which we are influenced by it).

While I certainly don’t mind seeing attractive women in television commercials, I am under no delusion that buying a product will result in some magical event. Likewise, I am not at all concerned about the many problems that television commercials suggest I should be concerned with (from body odor, to bad breath, to premature balding, to whiter teeth, ...). But maybe that’s just me.

So – how much are you influenced by television advertising? If not a lot, do you have a theory of why not?

I am repulsed by the deception and deviousness of most advertising.
Much of it has subliminal components that I pick up on and which makes me very uncomfortable, like I'm being violated.


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Commercials try to go under the radar of conscious reasoning. They try to control what you think subconsciously. They try to control how you feel about yourself and about other things.
They use emotional leverage to make you feel like you need something that you didn't think you needed before.
It's brainwashing.

I am not in the least bit influenced by advertising to purchase a certain product or to believe that owning a certain product will make me more popular, but then I don't buy very much for myself other than food. I haven't bought a new piece of clothing for myself in probably 7 months or so.

Unfortunately I am still influenced by TV to feel bad about myself because my romantic past wasn't very good and wasn't near what you see on TV. I do wish I could change those beliefs.

I'm not influenced by them. If they're trying to sell something I'm not interested in, which are most things, no amount of good advertising will make me buy it or want it. There was one commercial some years ago with a turtle that seemed to be flirting with a cell phone. I loved watching the turtle, but it didn't make me want the cell phone.

When I see something advertised that I'm interested in (like a new pizza flavor or a specific DVD), I'm not more interested or excited about if I see the commercial first. In most cases I have seen the product in the store before I saw the commercial, and I was equally interested in the product in either case.

Attractive people in commercials make absolutely no difference to me. I don't even think most of them are that good looking. I found the guy in the Levis commercials from 1993 (the Ring of Fire) really attractive, but it didn't make me buy or want Levis jeans. It just made me enjoy the commercial with that guy.
A couple of years before it was aired here, I got a couple of Levis jeans though, for the very simple reason that it was the in thing among some people in my junior high at the time. Like most at that age, I could be influenced by my peers. At the same time I also bought a Levis jumper because I really liked how it looked, I wasn't even consciously aware it was Levis at the time; I just dug the thin grey arms and the thicker body part in blue and the white text on the chest.

Commercials that try to play on demographics I should relate to make me nauseous. For instance, so-called female things will come with children that I'm supposed to find cute (but I don't), or they play on sex (which makes me uncomfortable). My reaction to them is the same as with manipulative human interest stories in the news, I'm repulsed by them.

Considering I only watch ABC, I'm not influenced by television advertising at all.

I don't watch TV. Out of other advirtisements, I do notice myself feeling more favorably to products/services/stores whose ads calmly explain their upsides without any fishy deceptive language (at least no fishy deceptive languge that I can detect). This isn't entirely rational, because I don't necessarily know how much of their alleged upsides are true... although if they use concrete objective facts, they risk getting in trouble for falsities.

If ads are annoying, and especially if they seem suspicious/deceptive, I might be influenced away from the product.

Probably

When I was growing up in the 1980's. I was somewhat influenced by television advertising. I always believed that if I got the toy that they advertised on TV during cartoon time. I would be cool at school and have friend. which of course, was totally false. Today. TV ads just annoy the crap out of me. I just can't stand to watch them anymore. Compare to the ads of the 80's. Today's ads just put me into an absolute sensory overload. It's actually hurts my head to watch some of the ads that they run on tv(and even YouTube) theses days.

I was influenced by them as a child, but not after my mid-teens.

99.9% of advertisements annoy me and make me want to not ever use any of the companies' products/services.
The few that I don't find maddening I generally find amusing, but they still don't make me want to give my money to whatever company it is.

Basically, you can't make me want something I didn't already want.

I haven't watched TV much in the last few years (usually about one hour a day now), but when I do I usually mute the volume and look at a book or my phone during commercials.

Knowing how they are trying to deceive us consumers, I'm more put off by ads than drawn to what they are trying to sell. I don't want to be one of the tricked.

I've always been an outcast and been conditioned to dislike what appeals to the "majority". It always reminds me of the minorities that are marginalized/oppressed. I must have developed a psychological opposition towards things that seem to appeal to shallow/vain/superficial people.

Having said that, I can be influenced by those ads for useful things such as Shamwow (spelling?), some fast cookers that are very easy to clean etc (even if an ugly sweaty-pig-looking person is in the ad).

I make a point of not being manipulated into purchasing something I didn't need or want until it was forced into my awareness by intrusive adds while I was relaxing in my sitting room.

TV advertising bugs me most of all, I hate the jump in volume between the program and the break for adds, when I watch TV I mute the advertising.

Occasionally, infomercials will get my attention, but I've never bought a product because of them either.

I find most advertising to be lame and annoying and tend to zone out on them. Some make me laugh, but not many. Every once in a while there will be a food commercial that will give me a craving, but that's about it.

Advertising is some of the most devious, dare I say 'satanic' s**t that has been put in place over us. It uses deceptive and manipulative psychological tactics to prey on people's insecurities to get them to buy a bunch of s**t they don't need. The graffiti mural artist and activist Banksy wrote this about advertising..

"People are taking the piss out of you everyday. They butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear. They leer at you from tall buildings and make you feel small. They make flippant comments from buses that imply you're not sexy enough and that all the fun is happening somewhere else. They are on TV making your girlfriend feel inadequate. They have access to the most sophisticated technology the world has ever seen and they bully you with it. They are The Advertisers and they are laughing at you. You, however, are forbidden to touch them. Trademarks, intellectual property rights and copyright law mean advertisers can say what they like wherever they like with total impunity. f**k THAT. Any advert in a public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours. It's yours to take, re-arrange and re-use. You can do whatever you like with it. Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head. You owe the companies nothing. Less than nothing, you especially don't owe then any courtesy. They owe you. They have re-arranged the world to put themselves in front of you. They never asked for your permission, don't even start asking for theirs."

I am not usually influenced by advertising.

I find it to be illogical and too much based on emotion.

I remember when car commercials changed, from describing what was so great about that particular car, to cars being driven fast down winding roads. I thought, "What is the point?" I liked hearing about what a particular car special. Now, one is supposed to get some sense of "excitement" from the idea of owning a particular car?

I also do not like shopping and I'm not really interested in hearing about an item unless I am already in the market to buy one. And when I do want to buy something, I am more influenced by reading the reviews than by the advertising. This is just one reason I love the internet. I can read the specs on the item and the reviews. I can find things I need or want that don't usually get advertised because they are not mainstream enough.

The only advertising I remember actually being influenced by were the "Hefty" and "Glad" commercials when I was a kid. I still remember how they went, and the quips that went along with them.

I am so glad I do not have regular TV anymore and only watch stuff online. The loudness of the commercials used to drive me bonkers. Ads are much more manageable online.