Let their fingers do the talking? Using the Implicit Association Test in market research

Aiden P. Gregg, James Klymowsky, Dominic Owens and Alex Perryman

Self-report methodologies – such as surveys and interviews – elicit responses that are vulnerable to a number of standard biases.

Let their fingers do the talking? Using the Implicit Association Test in market research

Aiden P. Gregg

University of Southampton

James Klymowsky, Dominic Owens and Alex Perryman

Seven Stones

Introduction

The most common way to tap the thoughts and feelings of participants in market research is to ask them questions (Bradburn et al. 2004). The ubiquity of self-report ‘techniques’ – including surveys and interview – confirms the general consensus: that what people say about themselves is revealing.

Yet not always: self-reports can sometimes yield biased or false data. For one thing,...

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