SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGYPSY30203

FNBE0414 APRIL INTAKE

SECOND INDIVIDUAL JOURNAL

TAN YIT FONG 0319133

This advertisement is put out by Astro Beyond, promoting their new high definition quality television service.

It is interesting because they took the stereotype of a close up beauty shot with an attractive girl- a young Caucasian with big blue eyes, sharp nose and strong, defined jaw line, and talked about the imperfections that we missed under the tagline “Here’s what you didn’t see”. Hence, the company decided to use, of all things, something that would be desirable to be looked at twice- sex appeal. The woman’s stare, amplified by the colour of her eyes and ample amount of skin simply oozes sensuality throughout the page. She is given almost the whole page to captivate the readers before they turn to the next page. The company decided to use physical attractiveness to to appeal to the reader’s liking.

However, they then point out in their caption the imperfections of her, although in no way prejudicing her. Instead, this forms a sort of reciprocation of information, which anybody could have easily missed out. This mechanism of persuasion plays to the reader’s sentiment of feeling indebted to those who do something for them, leading them to take a second look at the picture and notice the imperfections listed as follows “stray grey hair, split ends, blemish on right cheek, unflattering contact lens colour, lipstick bleed”. This two way interaction with the advertisement, diving deeper into the advertisement, would further persuade the reader regarding their product about the details that we miss everyday without their high definition quality television service.

In conclusion, it is not by chance that this advertisement entices the reader to look twice, and most important of all, think twice about purchasing their product. This particular advertisement calls on the readers to notice the details that they can bring to your television screen through a stereotyped beauty and reciprocation of information.