Social Psychology 

There are types of Social Psychology within advertising, from the Halo effect to the Devil Effect, and solidarity to status and prestige, in the blog there will be a more in depth look into the phenomenon's of the 'Halo Effect' and 'Solidarity' and how these have shaped advertising today.

The Halo Effect 

The Halo effect is a a social psychology phenomenon. It causes the customer to be biased in their judgement by having the same opinions towards one attribute of something to another unrelated attribute. The Halo effect theory is supported by the findings of (Thorndike 1920). He suggested people tend to judge others in blanket ways as positive or negative, Thorndike's research also has support of black and white thinking. In terms of advertising the Halo effect will be when a company or product finds success due to its association with a company ( smallbusiness-chron.com). An example of this is a corporate brand name. Some of these companies use the power of other products and marketing tools to set up a halo effect for other products. An example of this is Apple which is a highly successful umbrella brand.



 This is a classic example of the Halo Effect in this advert. The advert is promoting the new MacBook. Due to the success of the iPod, many people believed the Mac book would be highly successful. This is because of the Halo Effect as people buy the Mac book due to the success of the other products it has created (investopedia.com). Firstly the most iconic part of the advert is the size of the logo on the advert which is the main image on the advertisement, if the consumer recognises the logo it automatically sees a successful company.
The mac book has become so successful because of the previous product before it the iPod. Apple knew that the iPod would need a source of music which would now be the mac book.When you connect an iPod into the Mac book it allows you to do a lot of things to download music to syncing email contacts ( thestreet,com). Just with a limited detail advert like this one for the Mac book the product has produced five and half million sales this year so far (statista.com). This is all due to the concept of the halo effect from the success of one product a company can produce other products and still generate more sales even with limited advertisement.

Solidarity

Solidarity is the power of a unity of interests within a group and an attempt of persuasion in order to affiliate the consumer. (Hechter 1987) theory about social solidarity being characterized in motive of promoting group goals in their own right and that the consumer perceives a positive attitude towards them-self or in the advert terms the product or service being advertised. ( Hovland 2014) writes how solidarity in advertising is effective and that fellow 'group' members are more inclined to take what the other members are set to do. He also believes that companies selling the similar products will learn to respect each-other rather than always competing.

 
Solidarity is used in all forms of advertising an example seen here is the new breast cancer advert with the phrase the 'pink army' used. The aim of the advert is to gain members to compete in the race for life, in the advert they show all types of social classes from grans, mums to young teenage girls. It uses the theory of (Hovland 2014) as a way of getting more members to join the 'army'. It has been boosted by celebrity endorsement for example Nadine Coyle formerly of Girls Aloud who has said she has joined the 'pink army' as well. The advert is very persuasive and uses motivational music to hit at the 'members' and target audience of the advert to try and get them to sign up. Tajfel 1979) speaks how people who belong to a ‘group’ feel a sense of pride and belong to the social world, this is what the cancer research advert is aiming to do it’s to get women of social classes to join this ‘group’ and take part in the race for life and join the ‘pink army’.

Reference List 

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Grcic, Joseph. "The halo effect fallacy." Electronic Journal for Philosophy 2008 (2008): 1-6. - Small Business - Chron.com,. 'Halo Effect In Advertising'. N.p., 2015. Web. 29 Apr. 2015. - Investopedia,. 'Halo Effect Definition | Investopedia'. N.p., 2008. Web. 29 Apr. 2015. - Pendola, Rocco. 'What Ever Happened To Apple's Halo Effect?'. TheStreet. N.p., 2015. Web. 29 Apr. 2015. - Global sales of Apple Mac computers from 1st quarter 2006 to 1st quarter 2015 (in 1, 000 units). 'Apple Mac: Sales 2006-2015, Per Quarter | Statistic'. Statista. N.p., 2015. Web. 29 Apr. 2015. - Jeffries, Vincent. The Palgrave Handbook Of Altruism, Morality, And Social Solidarity. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. Print. - Hovland, Roxanne, Joyce Marie Wolburg, and Eric Haley. Readings In Advertising, Society, And Consumer Culture. Armonk, N.Y.: M.E. Sharpe, 2007. Print. - YouTube,. 'Race For Life 2015 TV Ad - Join The Pink Army'. N.p., 2015. Web. 29 Apr. 2015. - I-visual.deviantart.com,. 'Advert For Apple Macbook'. N.p., 2015. Web. 29 Apr. 2015. - Kruglanski, Arie W, and E. Tory Higgins. Social Psychology. Hove: Psychology, 2003. Print. - Derryjournal.com,. 'Nadine Coyle Joins Race For Life’S ‘Pink Army’'. N.p., 2015. Web. 29 Apr. 2015.

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