Priming

Essay by PaperNerd ContributorCollege, Undergraduate May 2001

download word file, 7 pages 0.0

Abstract The objective of our experiment, got a clue was to discover if we could change an individual's stereotypical perception on various items. We would try to achieve this change in perceptions by priming our subjects with positive or negative words flashed over the items for a short period of time. The first step taken to achieve our challenge was to have our subjects fill out questionnaire rating various objects from negative to positive, or negative to positive on a scale of one to five. After rating the various objects our subject then watched a slide show containing twenty of the forty items they had to rate on the questionnaire. The slide show consisted of three groups positive negative & controlled. During the slide show all subjects receives the same picture in a neutral state. The positive group received Positive priming, the negative group received negative priming and the controlled group received no priming just a steady picture.

After viewing the slide show our subject then repeated the questionnaire again to see if there perception of the objects had changed due to the slide show.

Got A Clue: Stereotypical Priming In our society today stereotypes are way that people are able to organize and categorized different things in our daily lives. Some stereotypes maybe positive or negative but they are all influenced by societies reaction to various things. The perceptions people may have about various things in their environment is caused by the connotations others may have put on these items. These stereotypes then shape the way we perceive and interact with these items. Our goal was to see if we could counter-stereotype peoples perception of various objects. We hoped to achieve this through the priming technique. This is a technique in which a subject is asked to classify or...