How focused attention can increase your desire

We usually give most of our focused attention to the thing we desire the most. Like those gorgeous pairs of shoes you happened to see this morning and you can’t stop thinking how great they will look on you.

This relationship between desire and attention seems quite straight forward – when we want something, we block out all other distraction and we’ll keep thinking about the object we want.

This study adds new knowledge to how our mind works when focus and emotions are involved substantiating previous studies which show us that positive emotions will widen our focus but negative emotions will narrow our attention.

But new research from Case Western Reserve University says that this relationship works the other way too – that is by increasing a person’s focus on a desirable object, the person will want that object even more.

This finding is important for marketers and for clinicians who are seeking to influence change in behaviour.

For this study, participants were shown images of desirable items like desserts and were also shown images of mundane items like furniture.

The participants were then instructed to pull a joystick if the image was tilted in one direction and push the joystick away if the image was tilted in the opposite direction.

Researchers recorded their reaction time for each pull or push.

Participants who reacted that fastest to pull the images of desserts were those whose attention was focussed. Responses for mundane items were much slower as well as for participants whose attention was broad. This suggests that narrow attention increases desire for desserts but not for everyday objects.

The study used pictures of desserts as it has been shown that dessert images increases desire, mostly due to the need to seek high calorie, high fat foods.

This study adds new knowledge to how our mind works when focus and emotions are involved substantiating previous studies which show us that positive emotions will widen our focus but negative emotions will narrow our attention and that both fear and desire are on the same spectrum – helping us focus our mental energy on something important.

From a marketing point of view, advertisements can hyper focus on a desirable aspect of a product to an audience who has shown an interest in a similar product, which it turn will increase the desire to buy that product.

Health-wise, clinicians can help patients develop a stronger focus on taking up certain activities – such as exercising – which they may desire but otherwise resist.

So if you were looking for a  pair of shoes and you happen to see the perfect pair in an advertisement, then it seems that you will want that pair even more than you know.

Source: Motivation and Emotion