Clotaire Rapaille How to find the Culture Code

IngredientsPen and PaperA regular sized nice and private roomChairsPillowsSoothing MusicA sample group of people of about 20 (the group has to consist of the people that representthe specific country that you are trying to break the culture code for. For example if you are trying to find out the codefor a certain product in America, then the group has to consistof Americans).

Mark Lalic Com 459 May 29, 2007 source: from Clotaire Rapaille

DescriptionDr. Clotaire Rapaille is a psychologist who studies cultural archetypes. His work has been used to helpidentify critical ingredients in customer loyalty, teamwork, and leadership. People are motivated by three levels of the brain

Cortex: the intellectual allibithis is where people try to givemore intellectual or logical explanations of why they do whatthey do.

Limbic: We act and react based on our earliest experience.

Reptilian: People act and behave on a survival instinct.

TheoryRapaille believes that to appeal to people based on their reptilian level would evoke very powerful levels of communication and Performance by convincing others that survival depends on whatis being proposed. The cultural archetyping methodology is a technique that is designed to discover and encode people’s limbic responses, as Rapaille believes that a cultural archetype exist within a certain group, company, or nation. Rapaille believes that people don’t say or know what they want, and therefore they are driven by their reptilian instinct based on theiremotional imprint of a certain product or idea.

Notes:Each session is designed to access a specific part of the brain. The first session deals with the cortex of the brain and is used as a washoutsession to delve deeper into the sub concious. The second and third sessiondeals with more of the emotional (limbic) side of the brain. The last part is used to access the first imprints of the specific product for each participant.

Session 2 of 4During the second session the group leader will take on the persona of a five years old child from another planet therefore asking the participants to explain what the certain word in this case luxury means to people from earth. This session is designed to eliminate any logical reasoning within the answers of the participants. Session 3 of 4During the third hour the participants will be sitting on the floor using scissors and a pile of magazines to Illustrate stories about what luxury means to them. This method is to offer further clues into the sub consciousfeelings of the participant. Session 4 of 4In the last part of the session dim the lights, play some soothing music in the background, and have the pillows on the ground. Have each participant lie down and start to have them relax trying to get them into the tranquil stateright before they fall asleep. When this occurs and your participants are relaxed have them go all the way back totheir childhood and their earliest memory of the meaning of luxury. The last session is designed to figure out what the first imprint of whatever word or object you are trying to figure out. Data AnalysisThe data includes transcripts of the discussions, stories, and individual discussions.All results should be analyzed at both the content level and semantic level.A synthesis of the cerebral responses are taken which focus on the verbs used by the interviewees in their stories and recollections. Both a positive and negative of their limbic responses are constructed. Finally the results are encoded in a description of the cultural archetype using the groups limbic responses during the fourth session.

Mark Lalic Com 459 May 29, 2007 source: from Clotaire Rapaille

Session 1 of 4The human being functions on three different levels of the brain, the cortex, the limbic and the reptilian.The first session will deal with the cortex of the brain.Within the first session the group leader will be asking questions about what a certain word (for example the word luxury) means to the people in the group. Because these are straightforward questions, the cortex will be answering the questions with more logical and intelligent meanings, therefore this part of the session is used to confuse the participants and is necessary to start to break through to the reptilian part of the brain.

Procedure/Data Collection

Translation example

Master Code

Basic Format

Cultural Archetype

Planning

Preparation

Data Collection

Data Analysis

Translation

Sub Code

Sub Code

Sub Code Sub Code

Special NoteThe focus group consists of bothblind study participants and fellowclients. The clients are used forbehind the curtain observation, and to also connect with the certain product or idea emotionally also.

ConclusionOnce the codes and data is translated the findings can beadapted towards a specific marketing campaign. Howeveronce the code is discovered itcan never be discovered again.