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Ralph Nader’s advertising watchdog Commercial Alert has written a letter to Emory University President James Wagner decrying the study of “neuromarketing” conducted at that University.

The letter suggests that by allowing the marketing consultancy firm BrightHouse use of their fMRI equipment for neuromarketing studies Emory is in danger of losing their public funding.

Emory has, rightly I believe, resisted Commercial Alert’s demands.

Neuromarketing is an infant field. I commented on its breaching into the public consciousness before. Now that my Cognitive Neuroscience class is finished I have a better understanding of the scientific issues involved. Neuromarketing should more properly be called applied affective neuroscience. The field is an outgrowth of the growing trend in neuroscience towards the study of more complex social and emotional aspects of cognition.

My professor even talked briefly about this paper in one of the class’ final lectures which focused on the future of neuroscience. He had read the New York Times article, and had contacted the author of the study. Unfortunately, the paper hasn’t been published yet so he was unable to procure a copy.

Emory was the facility used to perform the study the article describes. Researchers thre were able to compare the influence of branding on taste perception. On unbranded trials the results suggested Pepsi was more pleasing. When subjects were made aware of the brands involved, Coca-Cola waxed triumphant.

Especially interesting, was the type of change involved with brand awareness. Knowing the brand didn’t induce greater activation in pleasure areas. Instead, the the study found increased activation in the medial prefrontal cortex, an area usually implicated with highly developed social activity. The social characteristics of the brand unconsciously shaped subjects’ perception of the product.

Understandably, these types of results are concerning to an anti-advertisement group like Commercial Alert. This is a group that has successfully fought against increased marketing in schools, children’s television and public areas like subways. However, their reaction in this case is alarmist and ignorant.

In their letter they make reference to the possibility of discovering a “buy button in the skull”. They fold cold hands around warm necks with names and phrases like Orwell, the Soviet Union, totalitarian and mind control. Chilling language to describe fairly prosaic research.

This kind of research will have more effect on the practice of marketing than onthe practice of consumption. Right now marketers are doing exactly what the letter alleges. They are searching for a “buy button in the skull”. They do this in the crudest way possible, by asking consumers what they think in focus groups and the like.

Commerical alert supposes that this type of research will allow marketers to tailor the consumer to the product. Rather, this research is poised to give marketers better tools to tailor the product to the consumer.

The kind of social engineering found in the Coke-Pepsi Preference study has years and billions in marketing costs. Companies would rather sell people what people want rather than sell what they want to people. Its just easier.

Furthermore, the writers of the letter fail to show a basic understanding of the science involved. They claim that the strong magnetic fields used in fMRI research can have adverse health affects. Yet they have no evidence to support this claim.

Sure, just as their letter alleges, fMRI can be dangerous if you have metal in your body, or are carrying metal on your person. Which is exactly why fMRI researchers don’t accept subjects with metal in their body. I don’t know what kind of newfangled pockets the members of Commercial Alert have, but mine allow me to take things out just as well as I can put things in.

They also make the almost infinitely ignorant statement, ” It is hard to believe that this procedure[fMRI] is helpful when not medically required”.

First of all, MRI machines are one of wonders of modern medicine. This year’s Nobel Prize in Physiology of Medicine was awarded to Paul C. Lauterbur and Sir Peter Mansfield “for their discoveries concerning magnetic resonance imaging[MRI]“. MRI machines are nearly ubiquitous in modern hospitals. They are used everyday to diagnose and treat injuries and illnesses. They save lives.

There is some, but little difference between the MRI used in hospitals compared to that used for this kind of research. The magnetic fields used are stronger and the computer analysis more complex. As a tool of neurological examination fMRI works better, costs less and is leagues safer than its closest competitor, PET (Positron Emission Tomography) which involves injection of a radioactive isotope into the subject.

Finally, I find the very basis of their complaint unsatisfactory. They argue that this research does not advance the cause of human understanding or help eradicate disease, and thus should not receive public funding.

Marketing, whether we like it or not, is a major part of our modern environment. There is an implicit good in understanding how our environment affects our thought. This research helps us understand how we live. I cannot see how anyone could argue otherwise.

This letter is nothing but scaremongering over a non-issue. I am glad that their is a group hyperconscious to the insidious advance of marketing as it marches through our culture, but here they have gone too far.

(Thanks to Marginal Revolution for the pointer)

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