Mind Hacks

Hack #100. You Are What You Think

Thinking about how certain stereotypes behave can make you walk slower or get a higher score in a general knowledge quiz.

The concept of priming [[Hack #93]] runs all the way through explanations of how perception influences behavior. Subliminal perception of photographs can prime you to prefer those photos in the future [[Hack #82]], and simply spending time with someone who is, say, rubbing his face can infect you with his mannerism [[Hack #98]]. It’s not necessary to consciously perceive the photographs or the gestures for them to automatically alter our behavior.

Nowhere is this truer than in exemplar activation: being exposed to ideas of stereotypes of people (the exemplars), not even the people themselves, will prime the characteristic traits of those people, and you’ll begin to act in that way. It’s very odd, and very cool.

In Action

Here’s what John Bargh, Mark Chen, and Lara Burrows did ¹ : they gave 30 psychology undergraduates word puzzles to do (undergraduates are the raw material for most psychology studies). In half of the experiments, the puzzles included words associated with the elderly, like “careful,” “wise,” “ancient,” and “retired.” In the other half, all the puzzle words were neutral and not deliberately associated with any single concept. Immediately after individual students had completed the puzzle, they were free to go.

Bargh and team timed, using a hidden stopwatch, how long it took each undergraduate to walk down the corridor ...