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The Seductive Allure of Neuroscience: Can Info About Your Brain Change Your Mind? - Knowing Neurons

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Imagine you’re at home watching your favorite evening show after a long day at work, when a commercial for a new vitamin comes on. The ad claims their vitamin will help you focus and be more productive in all areas of life! They show images of brain scans of people who have taken the new vitamin, highlighting the areas the vitamin enhances so it can “work its magic.” Would you be persuaded to purchase and try the new vitamin? Now consider the same commercial, but instead of providing evidence of their vitamin’s effectiveness with brain scans, they show changes in scores on a cognitive test. Could that also persuade you? What if they don’t provide any scientific explanations for how the vitamin works? The “SANE” effect, or the Seductive Allure of Neuroscience Explanations, explains why this kind of persuasion works. This phenomenon suggests that people are more readily swayed to believe a concept when it is accompanied by a neuroscience-based explanation, whether conveyed by words or im

Imagine you’re at home watching your favorite evening show after a long day at work, when a commercial for a new vitamin comes on. The ad claims their vitamin will help you focus and be more productive in all areas of life! They show images of brain scans of people who have taken the new vitamin, highlighting the areas the vitamin enhances so it can “work its magic.” Would you be persuaded to purchase and try the new vitamin? Now consider the same commercial, but instead of providing evidence of their vitamin’s effectiveness with brain scans, they show changes in scores on a cognitive test. Co

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