The "Red Hammer" Effect?

[Elektrix]

Hi all,

I'm not going to go through the preamble of repeating the whole process, but just to explain, I got one of those e-mails where it first asks you to do a bunch of calculations in your head and then continue scrolling down further, to the point where it says "QUICK! THINK OF A TOOL AND A COLOR"

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You then scroll down a bit and it says "did you think of a red hammer?" and then adds a "stat" that 98% of people answer that, but 2% of the population thinks of something else and this indicates that you have an "abnormal mind".

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Anyway, my main question is more if there is anything to this beyond the similar types of questions? i.e. is it just based on the idea that "hammer" and "red" are going to be the common things that will pop into most people's heads?

I'm assuming that 98%/2% thing is just mumbo-jumbo. I'm also assuming all the math questions they ask you to do before asking the question is just to maybe trick people into thinking it has something to do with the question.

Anyway, I'm just curious if there's anything more interesting to this.

-Elektrix

[TheBoyPaj]

I think this is all just down to laziness and social conditioning. Our minds just leap to the most obvious thing, depending on what the media has fed to us. You can try to "fool" the questionner, but in the end you have to make a conscious decision to discard the thing you first thought of.

You can do similar things like "Think of a grey animal next to a foreign landmark"

(Elephant & Eiffel tower, assuming you're not in France)

From an advertiser's point of view, dominant brands achieve the same effect. Ask the question "where can you buy burgers?" and the immediate thought in most people's heads is McDonalds, even if they then discard it out of personal preference.

[Suezoled]

I thought of green pliers. and blue screwdrivers. and purple duct tape.

Wow. I could almost make a marshmallow-based cereal out of that.

[Hexxenhammer]

Originally posted by Suezoled
I thought of green pliers. and blue screwdrivers. and purple duct tape.

Wow. I could almost make a marshmallow-based cereal out of that. Handy-o's