Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Subliminal Messages
Between the Devil and the Media
ABSTRACT: We describe our entanglement in the ing upon the degree of religious belief held by the
controversial public issue of subliminal messages in proponents of these views, the backward messages are,
advertising and popular music in order to provide a at the least, thought to have been technologically en-
report of our research unencumbered by the misrep- gineered by the rock groups themselves or, at the
resentations in the various media reports of this work. worst, inserted by Satan.
A distinction is drawn between the allegedpresence of
these messages in the media concerned and the impact
Why Should We Pay Attention?
they are purported to have upon the listener or viewer. The announcer's and subsequently our interest in
Our research is concerned primarily with the latter: backmasking arose from the arrival in our city of Pas-
Is there any evidence to warrant assertions that such tor Gary Greenwald of the Eagle's Nest Fellowship in
messages affect our behavior? Across a wide variety California; Greenwald is a well-publicized proponent
of tasks, we were unable tofind any evidence to support of these views (Tisdall, 1983). While in our city,
such a claim. Secondarily, we present evidence to sug- Greenwald held a two-day public seminar on back-
gest that the apparent presence of backward messages masking in rock music, which culminated in a mass
in popular music is a function more of active construc- rally and a large record-smashing spree. At about the
tion on the part of the perceiver than of the existence same time, the house and senate of the state of Ar-
of the messages themselves. Finally, we describe our kansas were debating a bill that would require record
experiences with the public media's handling of these distributors to affix stickers to rock music albums
issues. warning the consumer of the possible presence of
backward messages. It was not long before a bill was
passed requiring that the following message be placed
In the fall of 1982 we were contacted by a local radio on records and tapes sold in the state: "Warning: This
announcer for information about a phenomenon he record contains backward masking which may be
referred to as "backmasking." However, his question perceptible at a subliminal level when the record is
did not concern the well-studied phenomenon of vi- played forward" (Associated Press, 1983). Similarly,
sual persistence (see DiLollo, 1980; Sakitt, 1976); the the California legislature passed a bill that stated that
announcer wanted to know what were the effects on the distribution of material containing backward
a listener of messages that allegedly had been recorded messages without public notice is an invasion of pri-
backward into popular rock music. He informed us vacy, thereby allowing the distributors of such material
that when such recordings are played in the normal, to be sued (Easley, 1983). Apparently, several elected
forward fashion, the messages are not consciously representatives in at least one other state (Texas) have
perceived; however, played backward, intelligible considered the introduction of similar legislation, and
messages can be heard. His concern was not that lis- at least one Canadian member of parliament and the
teners would play their records backward and thereby Consumers Association of Quebec also have sup-
"hear" the messages but rather that the messages ported government investigation into the issue (Son-
would be perceived unconsciously by the listener when mor, 1984). Clearly, political lobbying by the propo-
the recording was played forward. He informed us nents of these beliefs has been successful.
that those who advocated this belief also claimed that We should emphasize that Greenwald is not the
the messages had an evil content and that, upon hear- sole proponent of backmasking in rock music nor
ing them, the youthful listener was led down a path necessarily the individual with the most impact. Oth-
of loose morality and behavioral aberration. Depend- ers include Hot Springs minister Don Hutchings, who
N o v e m b e r 1985 • A m e r i c a n P s y c h o l o g i s t 1239