How You Are Influenced by Psychometrics When You Like Another Post on Facebook

How You Are Influenced by Psychometrics When You Like Another Post on Facebook

As technology advances marketing has gained new methods to influence the consumer’s decision-making process. In offline sales, it’s more straightforward to establish direct communication with every customer individually however, online sales offer an unreliable interaction with sellers, requiring the identification of any pain points via indirect indicators. For instance, in digital marketing, it’s usually necessary to test various advertising creatives and combinations to improve customer experience and constantly examine performance metrics. For large corporations technologies such as Big Data and data science are increasingly helping in this process.

With the advent of modern, internet-based behavioral psychology, it’s now possible to access our minds or in other words the unconscious, of users, without their knowledge. We’ll also attempt this by suggesting that you join the Channel on Telegram with plenty of valuable information about making money. The legality and ethics of these methods remain a matter of debate. The current practice of using psychological profiles of users is costly, but it allows the spread of political views and an influence on millions of people. Let’s explore the ways in which this happens.



What Is Psychometrics, and Why Is It Needed?

Psychometrics is a field that permits the assessment of a person’s personality and the production of a structured report from the data collected. It’s a promising area within the study of behavior. There is no precise time frame for the beginning of psychometrics however some believe that it has its origins to be in the 1870s, when German scientist and physiologist and psychotherapist Wilhelm Wundt aimed to measure the intensity of human sensations. For others, the beginning date is 1905 which was the year that the very first IQ test, called the Binet-Simon scale, was created. In the beginning, the main goal of psychometrics was the measurement of students their abilities and understanding through tests. In time, this pattern was further developed throughout the United States, where tests remain extensively utilized as the standard for educational and psychological research. Gradually testing and the measurement of results spread across the globe. Today, the leading countries that set standards in psychometrics include those of the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and Belgium.

Thanks to the advancement of digital technology and machines learning techniques, the field of psychometrics morphed into the field of psychology in general. The boundaries have more blurred. Nowadays, psychometric techniques are utilized in the fields of sociology, medicine, and marketing. In all of these areas research, scientists draw conclusions regarding human behavior using well-structured data.

How Psychometrics Is Used in Marketing

The current wave of attempts to influence consumer behaviour in the digital age started with the advent of Big Data. However, this strategy has had a few major disadvantages. Methods to analyze huge data sets remain inadequate, and predicting user behavior from the data is an extremely difficult task. Only big corporations such as Google and Amazon can claim to have had success in tackling these tasks, so far, since the majority of companies do not have access to large amounts of information. While data can be bought however, there are questions about the quality of data, its completeness, and processing capabilities.

A more comprehensive approach to understanding the motives of consumers was suggested by Michal Kosinski who was an British scientist who is of Polish descent. Kosinski was the first person to develop digital psychometrics, which allowed the identification of personality traits in the context of a users behavior when using Facebook. Since 2010 Kosinski was studying Data Science, initially as an associate of the Psychometrics Centre at the University of Cambridge and later an instructor at the Stanford Graduate School of Business beginning in 2015. The year 2016 was the first time he carried out an experiment with Facebook users that involved psychotargeting, leading to a revolutionary marketing tool that can reveal the hidden motives behind users. This is a brand new level of personalization in marketing that companies were striving to achieve since the beginning of the age of digital.

Michal Kosinski

Based on a person’s digital footprint, it’s possible to identify their personality type, gender gender, sexual orientation, skin color and political beliefs, and other traits. Digital footprints are comprised of comments on certain posts or shares, the history of browsing, comments and searches. Michal Kosinski states that it can take as little as 10 likes to allow a machine learning system to be able to recognize you more than your coworker at work. With 230 to 240 likes and counting, computers can understand more about you than your partner. All of the data that belongs to millions of users could be purchased or sold through the market for black goods, which is a source that is actively used by businesses. There is a program called Acxiom that gathers massive quantities of user information from all over the world. It is possible to purchase details, for instance of unmarried men of 25-40 years within Massachusetts or women between the ages of 18 and 32 from Chandigarh, the Indian State of Chandigarh.

Furthermore, you are able to independently collect data about the psychological profiles of users for launching a campaign for instance, on Facebook. In order to do this, you have to create a mental model of people who are inclined to certain behaviors by requiring thousands of users to take a specific test. After the model is completed and you are able to ask artificial intelligence to recognize people, like those who are introverts, and they may enjoy 12 certain films or artists. You can now build an inventory of people who enjoy specific content and focus them with targeted advertising.

However, it’s not the only thing. Digital psychometrics can also provide precise forecasts of user behavior, exceeding the efficacy of target survey of the audience and focus groups and testing.

Psychometrics as a Service: Who and How Analyzes Our Digital Footprints

There are companies that use psychometrics to assess users’ personality characteristics and selling the data they collect to companies. Artificial intelligence, which is based on the classic models of psychological research can be used to deal with huge amounts of data. One of the most popular theories is called the OCEAN model, also known as”the “Big Five,” which can be used to evaluate five essential personality traits:

  • The willingness to learn from experience
  • Conscientiousness
  • Extroversion
  • Agreeableness
  • Neuroticism

The other mental model for the brain is called Schwartz’s Value Orientation. These two models have achieved broad acceptance throughout academia and have been tested over time.

There are also solutions for psychometrics for data analysis that are based on the latest psychological models specially created for marketing purposes. Their effectiveness hasn’t been thoroughly explored to date.


Simplified Scheme of Psychometric Profiling Based on Facebook Data

One of the most popular tools offered to marketers included IBM’s Watson Personality Insights, which has since been shut down. This tool was able to create of psychological profiling on an person based on their text. It used an OCEAN model to identify the personality traits and Schwartz’s method to measure the level of motivation. Customized models, designed by the company and used to assess individual needs. The service also provided examples on its website that illustrated the application of its model for marketing.


Psychographic Profile Created Using IBM’s Solution

The application of the Magic Sauce service, designed in the course of Cambridge research team, is a different instrument that makes use of Michal Kosinski’s research. Finding a person’s psychological profile through this platform is simple You just need to input the details of their Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn profile. The well-known OCEAN model is used to identify personality traits.

In the field of online psychometrics there’s also partly domestic developments. For instance, the Russian-British company Datasine which has been in operation since 2015, has been assisting in the personalization of marketing campaigns. In various instances customers comprised Aegon Insurance, Tinkoff, Raiffeisen, and BNP Paribas. Then, in 2021 Shutterstock purchased the company.


Psychometrics and Politics: Why You Don’t Make the Choices

Incredibly, psychometrics plays an important role in determining the destiny of whole nations, and is utilized in the political arena. The process began with Cambridge Analytica, the firm Cambridge Analytica, whose former director, Alexander Nix, claimed in March 2017 that they had been able to collect an individual psychometric profile for every adult in the United States. This shouldn’t be a surprise given the fact that Cambridge Analytica had assisted Donald Trump during the 2016 election by obtaining information from Facebook and analyzing it and making use of the information to develop targeted ads. The amount received from the president at the time was estimated to be $15 million. In the year 2016 Cambridge Analytica worked in the United Kingdom, supporting Nigel Farage an ardent Brexit supporter. The company’s efforts helped to influence millions of British electors, according to documented by the Swiss newspaper Das Magazin in December 2016.

Incredibly, Das Magazin also suggested that Cambridge Analytica had used developments similar to Kosinski’s research. It is believed that one of Kosinski’s associates had disclosed his findings from research in the direction of Cambridge Analytica. In the end, Kosinski was recognized internationally and was accused of developing massive psychological weapons. Cambridge Analytica later entered contracts with the French National Front and operated during elections in over 20 countries. The company has since been declared bankrupt.

To effectively influence the minds of users to influence user minds, it is important not just to collect and organize data, but also to use the data correctly. For example, Cambridge Analytica specialists, in the course of working on Trump’s presidential campaign, found subtle links between the traits of a person’s personality and the behavior of users. They observed that people who prefer American-made vehicles tend to favor their clients. In a recent conversation, Alexander Nix explained that the moment a particular group of customers showed high levels of concentration and high neuroticism, in the OCEAN scale then they would be shown a commercial that was designed to provoke emotions by using the fear of non-compliance and rationality. The approach was to infuse the ads with emotional meanings that would resonate with the unconscious motivations of the particular group of users.

Header on Experian’s website. an online service that assists in shaping the minds of voters using psychographics. The clients of the company were of the Labour and Conservative Parties of the British Parliament.


Application Cases of Psychometrics in Marketing

GutCheck A company that is focused in research using big data gives the following example of how they work with psychometrics in their site. The objective was to design efficient advertisements for yoga pants. After gathering and analysing data, two types that comprised women were identified as the ones with high levels of extroversion and those with moderate extroversion, but high conscientiousness. Below are advertisements in the first category (on left) and the second category (on left):

Michal Kosinski and his colleagues carried out a study on marketing that demonstrated the effect of ads that are designed using psychographic profiles of their behavior.

The group divided the work to the three Facebook studies, where ads were displayed to 3.7 million people. Study 1 and 2 sought to determine the reactions of people to the ads based on their extrovert and openness to experiencing levels in accordance with the OCEAN scale. To study users, researchers extracted data on Facebook* likes from several million individuals in the http://mypersonality.org/ database. The scores of people who took an International Personality Items pool (IPIP) survey, comprised comprising 100 questions, was also taken from the database. Based on the information researchers calculated the individuals’ personality characteristics and separated these into different groups. Study 3 was based off the findings from studies 1. and 2.

In the first study Results of Facebook ads targeted at females with very high and very low degrees of introversion were revealed. The campaign was focused on cosmetics and the advertisements ran for seven days. The campaign reached 3129 993 users, drew 10 346 clicks and resulted in 390 purchases on the website of the cosmetics store. The ads that were that were used:

On the left side are advertisements for women with high levels of extroversion and to the left side are ads targeted at women with lower levels of extrovertivity.

Here are the statistics for the campaign:

Cost per conversion = CPConv and CR is the conversion rate (installs/reach 100) CTR = click-through ratio (clicks/reach 100) ROI = Return on Investment (profit/expenditure 100).

In the second study the campaigns were designed to advertise a crossword puzzle app. The effects on people with higher openness experiencing and people with low openness to experience was assessed. The campaign was available across Facebook, Instagram, and Audience Networks for 12 days. The campaign reached 84 176 people with 1 130 clicks and led to 500 apps being installed.

Here are some of the ideas used by people with various levels of openness

On the left, there is high openness to experience and to the right, there is moderate openness.

Here are the outcomes after finishing the campaign

In the study 3 the researchers created a bubble shooter game on Facebook for seven days. The audience of the campaign was evaluated against the users of rival apps (Farmville as well as Bubble Popp). The analysis of the likes and comments from their users showed that they were largely introverted people. Researchers chose an even larger portion of these users and split the group into two sections. A portion of the group received an advertisement with typical text for people who are people who are extroverts, and the second group was presented with text that was tailored to introverts. In the instances where the advertisement was tailored to the psychological profile of the user, CTR and the conversion rate are 1.3 and 1.2 times higher and 1.2 times higher, respectively.

Here are the statistics of the campaign:

The campaign was viewed by 534250 users, resulted in 3 173 clicks and resulted in the installation of 1 837 apps.

Conclusion

Like all important inventions psychometric profiling comes with huge advantages and dangers. Michal Kosinski said in one interview that his method can assist people find work that matches their interests and psychotypes with greater accuracy. Furthermore, these methods are able to be applied in the field of psychotherapy, and employee selection for public agencies and private businesses. According to Kosinski psychometrically-targeted advertising in marketing can increase the effectiveness of campaigns.

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