The test of this material is whether or not we can identify the factors that will allow us to construct a better meme, which we tackle here, and whether we can make it stick in the brain.
You will remember in Memeplexes the comparison to a stealth bomber, where wings, camouflage, guns, bombs, engines and so on were useless by themselves but powerful when combined, and were all there so a payload could be delivered. So I want to look at design of a memeplex consisting of at least two types of meme: the payload (the message you are trying to get across) and the container the payload is packaged in.
Let’s start with a simple checklist for the container:
- It must be distinctive - the target audience has to pick it out of the noise;
- It must be simple , and clearly articulated in a language that the target audience understands;
- It must be placed in the right medium (‘right’ depends on its complexity);
- It should have a ‘hook‘, such as a catchy theme tune, iconic images or a brand the target audience already recognise and buy into.
And here is another simple checklist for your payload:
- It must be new, or contain novel elements;
- It must seem compelling and relevant (i.e. obviously of value and thus worth remembering);
- It must be self-consistent (i.e. containing no elements that directly contradict each other);
- It should contain elements of an immune system to protect it once it’s installed;
- It’s a good dea to bundle in a trigger - something that can be separately transmitted but that acts as a reminder of a complex meme, such as a jingle, the sign of the cross, or the slogan ‘walls have ears’;
- Ideally, it must fit with what the target audience already believes, and it must not trigger their inbuilt immune system (i.e. it does not contradict those beliefs which the audience already believes to be true and holds dear);
- Preferably, it should already be believed by some of the target audience;
- It must make the recipient think ‘makes sense’ (logos), ‘I trust him’ (ethos) or ‘I care’ (pathos) - more on that here; and
- It should trigger our basic instincts, such as sex, fear, nurturing or eating.
And now for a bit of pop psychology…
Any psychology professors reading this will be nodding frantically by now. Behind a shield of polysyllabic names, they believe that ideas are accepted more easily if they are new (‘Von Restorff effect’) or if they fit with what you already believe (‘confirmation bias’); that positive feelings can be created or reinforced by repeated exposure to an idea (‘mere exposure effect’); and that beliefs are reinforced, and indeed become more radical, when shared in a group (‘group polarisation’).
Psychologists are particularly taken with group conformity effects, or how beliefs expressed by others affect our opinions. Solomon Asch performed an experiment back in the 1950s in which subjects were asked to answer a simple question after hearing a number of ‘plants’ give an obviously false answer: a good proportion of the test subjects would agree with the majority view despite clear evidence that it was incorrect (Asch 1951).
Group polarisation is even more alarming: here, groups come to conclusions that are more extreme than the average belief of the group. When people with a similar viewpoint get together (say, to discuss the danger of breast implants or of a waste incinerator), most will find that they do not hold the most radical views in the group, and positive reinforcement by others means they will drift towards more extreme viewpoints. If you ever wondered how memetic diseases like Nazism spread, there are a couple of clues.
Spreads like butter….
We want to make sure your meme spreads easily: to do this, ensure that it contains elements that can be easily expressed and transmitted. You already know how to do this:
- Package it simply: if you are using verbal media, use simple language with short sentences and few polysyllabic words.
- Repeat, repeat, repeat.
- Choose a medium with the right balance of richness and reach for the memeplex. If you have to choose go for reach.
Next, if all else fails, try cognitive dissonance. An interesting exception to the discussion on filtersis the use of cognitive dissonance in advertising by companies like Benetton. Here the creators of the meme are deliberately using images or messages that are not comforting, and which may be startlingly different from what the target audience believes. Why do something that is bound to trigger an immune reaction? Because the amygdala force the recipient to think about the message and make a conscious decision to accept or reject it rather than just subconsciously booting it out. It may not always work, but at least the message got noticed.
Most of us have encountered people who are extremely good at recognising and storing patterns such as music and images, or other people who are better at processing symbols and logic. At risk of a generalisation, humans have a range of learning styles, which can be roughly described as ‘hearing’, ‘seeing’ and ‘practising’, and which must be borne in mind when designing complex memes. So the next suggestion is to use multiple media.
Think of a TV advert that you really admire: it probably consists of a series of arresting images, a memorable tune and words, and you probably remembered one of these factors before the others. And of course, when you see the images or hear that tune again, it reinforces the meme the advertiser wanted you to remember. It should therefore come as no surprise at all when I say that Gardner (2006) maintains that memes that are carried in a range of media - music, images, words and actions - are more easily absorbed.
Another trick is to make sure that those who are interested in finding out more about the ideas can do so easily - use modern storage mechanisms rather than relying on short-lived expressions like TV broadcasts or word-of-mouth. Ensure that a potential convert, perhaps someone who is looking for information to help him accept or reject an idea, finds lots of well-written supporting proof wherever they look. Magazines, books, tapes and CDs are all better storage mechanisms than the human brain: they don’t die and they don’t forget. The best mechanism of all is the Internet: not only is information easily found through a search engine, it can gain new converts if they stumble into it through luck or while looking for something else.
Finally, we are not born with our set of filters but we develop them as we grow. Experts on the cognitive development of children, such as Jean Piaget, think that children below the age of seven (it varies from child to child, of course) lack the skills for abstract thought or the ability to evaluate more than one possible outcome. So if you want to pass on memeplexes that no sane adult would contemplate - such as ones that require unquestioning faith and obedience - teach them to young children. A well-understood application of this get ‘em young principle in business is to hire new graduates with little or no experience of work: since they don’t know what’s impossible, they will work harder and be easier to programme than more experienced hires. Henry Ford once described his recruitment policy thus: ‘I am looking for a lot of men who have an infinite capacity to not know what can’t be done.’
Making it sticky
So we’ve looked at the design criteria for container and payload memes. These will get your meme noticed and implanted. But that’s not enough: it needs to stick.
Avoiding defection once the idea is planted is somewhat harder. We know that memes die out because they don’t get transmitted well or because adherents defect from the idea. So if we really want to make the change stick, the memeplex has to be adopted and protected by the host’s immune system.
At this point, it’s probably worth revisiting the section on the memetic nature of religion. As we saw, these memeplexes are tremendously sticky because they have:
- Reinforcing behaviours: if a memeplex installs habits such as reading the Bible each morning or going to church on Sunday, these will reinforce the it, which in turn will reinforce the habitual behaviours. In a corporate context, an example would be frequent testing against the key points of corporate culture using an appraisal system that further embeds the ideas and tests loyalty to them.
- A Holy Book that serves as a definition of the meme and ensures copy fidelity. In organisations this would be a process manual or similar, marketing people would use a brand book;Defence against new ideas: a good memeplex will cause its adherents to reject contrary information. This can either manifest as ‘faith’, whereby evidence (or lack of evidence) is ignored, or ‘heresy’ whereby contrary ideas and their holders can be violently attacked, and
- Evangelism: if there are rewards for spreading the meme, such as enhanced social standing, then existing believers have their beliefs reinforced and new converts get to hear the message.