{"id":10709,"date":"2020-07-01T17:06:00","date_gmt":"2020-07-01T21:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=10709"},"modified":"2020-07-10T13:50:34","modified_gmt":"2020-07-10T17:50:34","slug":"fixed-action-patterns-cialdini","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/fixed-action-patterns-cialdini\/","title":{"rendered":"Fixed Action Patterns: Why You\u2019re as Predictable as a Turkey"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Have you ever been persuaded to purchase something that you later regretted? A fixed action pattern probably influenced you. Have you ever been manipulated into contributing money to a charitable cause that you didn\u2019t actually support? Again, this is another fixed action pattern example.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Fixed-action patterns are the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mental-shortcuts\/\">mental shortcuts<\/a> and assumptions that we use to fill in the blanks of our everyday experience<\/strong>. They are also known as modal action patterns. A lot of persuasion rests on the manipulation of human fixed-action patterns.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Learn about fixed action patterns in humans and how they make us like turkeys.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What Is a Fixed Action Pattern?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Every day, we are bombarded with advertisements and appeals that target fixed action patterns in humans. They ask us to buy something, join some organization, or get involved in some cause. Clearly, <strong>there is great advantage in using fixed action patterns to persuade people to do things.<\/strong><br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But who are these persuaders and how are they so effective at manipulating us into doing what they want?<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Compliance Practitioners<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>A compliance practitioner is anyone whose job is to get you to say \u201cyes\u201d to what they\u2019re offering. They can be:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>A salesperson who wants you to buy her product.<\/li><li>An activist who wants you to volunteer for her cause.<\/li><li>A fundraiser who wants you to donate to her charity.<\/li><li>A politician who wants you to vote for her.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Their specific agendas may be different, but they\u2019re all after the same thing. They\u2019re <em>all <\/em>in the persuasion business and they all want to persuade <em>you<\/em>. How do they do this? By manipulating the modal action patterns that get you to say \u201cyes\u201d before you even consider the consequences.<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>How Humans Are Like Turkeys<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>A brief fixed-action pattern example will illustrate what we mean. Turkey mothers are known to be caring and protective of their young. But what animal researchers have discovered is that the turkey mothers\u2019 nurturing modal action pattern is triggered by a \u201ccheep cheep\u201d noise that the turkey chicks make. This noise is the mother\u2019s signal to care for the chicks. Remarkably, however, the mother will neglect to care for the chicks if the latter fail to make the \u201ccheep cheep\u201d noise.<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Researchers further discovered that these same maternal instincts can be triggered by man-made replicas of animals other than turkeys (even natural predators), as long as the replicas make the same \u201ccheep cheep\u201d noise. <strong>This is a classic fixed-action pattern example: a sequence of behaviors that consistently happen in the same way and in the same order.<\/strong> Behavior A (the \u201ccheep cheep\u201d noise) can always be counted on to produce Behavior B (the nurturing behavior) every time.<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But it turns out that we humans aren\u2019t so different from turkeys. <strong>We have <em>our <\/em>fixed-action patterns too<\/strong>. Like clockwork, we will behave the same way in response to the same stimuli. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/how-to-avoid-being-manipulated\/\">Compliance practitioners<\/a> are experts in exploiting fixed-action patterns in humans: they know exactly which inputs to use in order to produce the outputs that they want from us.<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Mental Shortcuts<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>You might be thinking that fixed-action patterns are a bad thing for human beings to have, that they\u2019re some design flaw in our cognitive wiring. But they\u2019re not.<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In fact, fixed-action patterns are <em>essential <\/em>for human beings to process and order all of the information in our world. <strong>Think of human modal-action patterns as mental shortcuts. <\/strong>We could never individually assess every aspect of every situation we encountered, even in the course of a normal day: it would lead to mental overload and an inability to make any decisions at all.&nbsp;<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is why general categories are useful. You can\u2019t examine the properties of every blade of grass before you walk across a field or measure every grain of sand before you walk across a beach. We <em>need <\/em>some way to aggregate all of this information and distill it down to general rules of behavior that inform our responses to situations.<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>This <\/em>is the power and utility of fixed-action patterns. <strong>They fill in the blanks for us so that our brains don\u2019t need to overload.<\/strong><br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As the world becomes even more complex and we have access to more and more information, fixed-action patterns in humans will become more important than ever. <strong>The more information we need to process, the more we\u2019ll rely on mental shortcuts.<\/strong><br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Short-Circuiting the Shortcuts<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>The problem, then, isn\u2019t that we <em>have <\/em>these mental shortcuts. It\u2019s that compliance practitioners have become skilled at <em>exploiting <\/em>them for their own advantage. In doing so, they pull a trick on us: <strong>compliance practitioners short-circuit our mental shortcuts by getting us to behave the <\/strong><strong><em>right <\/em><\/strong><strong>way in response to the <\/strong><strong><em>wrong <\/em><\/strong><strong>stimuli.&nbsp;<\/strong><br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Here&#8217;s a fixed action pattern example. Most people\u2019s instincts would tell them that a higher-priced item is more valuable than a lower-priced item. And the vast majority of the time, this instinct would lead you to the correct conclusion: pricey items generally <em>are <\/em>expensive because they\u2019re rarer or higher quality. But this instinct can also be exploited by clever salespeople. The book shares the story of an antique shop owner who <em>raised <\/em>the prices of an item that had previously been selling poorly. Within a day, customers had bought every unit!<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These customers weren\u2019t drawn to the item because they knew it was better or rarer. They were relying solely on the big price tag to guide their behavior, reasoning, \u201cIt must be good if they\u2019re charging this much for it!\u201d Thus, the shop owner was able to manipulate the customers into doing what their instincts told them to do, but for the wrong reason (the item wasn\u2019t really valuable or rare): not all that different from a turkey.<br><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Have you ever been persuaded to purchase something that you later regretted? A fixed action pattern probably influenced you. Have you ever been manipulated into contributing money to a charitable cause that you didn\u2019t actually support? Again, this is another fixed action pattern example. Fixed-action patterns are the mental shortcuts and assumptions that we use to fill in the blanks of our everyday experience. They are also known as modal action patterns. A lot of persuasion rests on the manipulation of human fixed-action patterns. Learn about fixed action patterns in humans and how they make us like turkeys.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":10724,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[101],"class_list":["post-10709","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-psychology","tag-influence","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v24.3 (Yoast SEO v24.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Fixed Action Patterns: Why You\u2019re as Predictable as a Turkey - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Fixed-action patterns are the mental shortcuts and assumptions that we use to fill in the blanks. A lot of persuasion rests on manipulating them. Learn why.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/fixed-action-patterns-cialdini\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Fixed Action Patterns: Why You\u2019re as Predictable as a Turkey\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Fixed-action patterns are the mental shortcuts and assumptions that we use to fill in the blanks. A lot of persuasion rests on manipulating them. 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