OUGD501 - Vance Parkard - Hidden Needs

Vance Packard discusses the routes of brands/advertisers & how they exploit our needs psychologically with specific terminology & imagery. After reading in depth about the hidden needs it has enabled me to disagree with ads for the reasons of tapping into our insecurities and emotions and turn us to buying their products for emotional therapy. 

With these 3/8 hidden needs, I am going to produce 3 consistent ad posters which create awareness of the doings, to also communicate reasonable colour phycology to make us feel a certain emotion. 

Because my essay is based on the phycology within desire I thought it would prominent idea to include a visual source that would help communicate back to the essay, that source would be colour theory. Aside from that overall outcome will be to create awareness of advertisement enticement 

Reassurance of worth

In a connected world we can lose sense of who we are and what we are worth. We thus seek reassurance that we are adding value and deserve our place in society.

Adverts play to this when they promise that if you buy products you will be doing the right thing, for example in saving the environment or helping others.

Sense of power

When we are in control we a sense of ability to choose and perhaps power over others. When we can direct others we move up the social order and so are, theoretically at least, safer. Big cars, chunky tools, solid houses and old banks all make us feel safe and, when we own or use them, powerful.

Adverts thus emphasize the solidity and reliability of the products they sell. They insinuate how buying will put you in charge. They imply that you are in control when you decide to make that purchase.

Immortality

Perhaps the biggest fear we have is of death. Or maybe not death but of ceasing, of becoming nothing. We likewise seek to create meaning in our lives so we may live beyond death. We have children, write books, build companies and more. We also seek to cheat age, striving to look younger when perhaps we should grow older more gracefully.

Adverts play to this with age-defying products and spry older people playing and enjoying life. They use young people to help us avoid thinking about death and encourage us to recapture a lost youth.