Just how powerful are our emotions? Here, Leif Stromnes managing director, strategy and growth, DDB Australia, explains that our feelings might be more powerful than we typically imagine.
In 1995, a 29-year-old British construction worker accidentally jumped off a low scaffold onto an upturned 17-centimetre, (seven-inch in old money) nail. The nail pierced his boot clean through to the other side. Seeing his extreme pain, his co-workers called emergency services, and an ambulance rushed the young man to Accident and Emergency (A&E) in West London.
Because moving the nail even slightly caused the man enormous pain, the A&E doctors quickly sedated him with midazolam, which is used before surgery to induce drowsiness or unconsciousness. It illustrates the severity of the young man’s pain that the doctors also administered fentanyl, a painkiller often prescribed for terminal cancer patients that is one hundred times more powerful than morphine. Morphine was the pain relief drug given to wounded soldiers in the Second World War.
With the patient sedated and his pain controlled, the doctors proceeded to carefully remove his work boot. When they were finally able to remove it, they discovered something startling; the nail had passed cleanly between the builder’s toes. There was no injury at all.
How is it possible that with no physical injury, this young man was in such agony that not even fentanyl, the world’s most powerful pain relief medication was able to settle him down?
The answer lies in the emotional context that was created by the injury; his horrified co-workers, the wailing sirens of the ambulance, the bumpy and frantic journey to the hospital, the bright lights and beeping medical equipment of A&E, the concerned and attentive doctors.
His emotions screamed pain, and as a result, his body felt pain.
Our emotions are so powerful, they can work in the reverse way too.
After a particularly enjoyable game of soccer, for instance, you may walk off the pitch and realise your knee is bleeding. But you hadn’t noticed or felt pain up until this moment.
Dr. Henry Beecher, a wartime anaesthesiologist, reported a similar phenomenon in a 1946 article about wounded soldiers. He noticed that the extent of soldiers’ injuries didn’t correlate with the degree of pain they experienced. In fact, 75 per cent of the severely wounded soldiers—now safe from battle with the comforting possibility of going home—reported little to no pain despite having serious injuries. In the words of the esteemed doctor: “There is a common belief that wounds are inevitably associated with pain, and, further, that the more extensive the wound, the worse the pain” (Beecher, 1946). This, he observed, was not true.
Emotions are such powerful forces. They can seemingly defy gravity. By making people feel something profound, and by creating the right emotional context, we can not only influence what people purchase but also how they experience their purchases once they get them home.
Much like doctors who prefer to segregate body from mind when treating patients, marketers are equally hasty to apportion budget to emotional brand building OR to rational selling messages. The temptation is to always double down on the perceived harder-working sales activation campaigns.
What this story teaches us is that humans are in the main emotional creatures and emotions can work in ways that rational messages simply cannot. As world-renowned neuroscientist Antonio Damasio puts it, “We are not thinking machines that feel; rather we are feeling machines that think”. We should keep this order firmly in mind when designing persuasive marketing communications.
