05 - Cognitive Ease скачать в хорошем качестве

05 - Cognitive Ease

When something feels familiar, clear, or easy to process, we tend to believe it more and accept it without review. This "cognitive ease" can come from repetition, legible fonts, good mood, or simple messages. The chapter connects fluency with confidence, credibility, and persuasion... even when the content is weak. Cognitive ease and cognitive strain are on opposite ends of a continuum. When you experience cognitive ease, you are in a good mood, you like what you see, you believe what you hear, you trust your intuitions, and you feel that the current situation is comfortable and familiar. You are also likely to be relatively casual and superficial in your thinking. When you experience cognitive strain, you are more likely to be vigilant and suspicious, invest more effort, feel less comfortable, and make fewer errors—but you are also less intuitive and creative. The chapter presents research showing that cognitive ease is influenced by multiple factors: repeated exposure (mere exposure effect), clear display (good font, high contrast, simple language), primed ideas, and good mood. Conversely, unfamiliar stimuli, poor legibility, complex language, and bad mood create cognitive strain. These effects are powerful: statements printed in clear fonts are judged more likely to be true than the same statements in hard-to-read fonts. A troubling finding is that familiarity breeds liking and trust, regardless of whether that familiarity is deserved. The mere exposure effect explains why advertising works through repetition—not by conveying information but by creating cognitive ease. A brand name or slogan becomes familiar through repetition, cognitive ease increases, and people develop a preference without any rational basis. This is why "fake news" repeated frequently can feel true. The chapter has practical implications for communication and persuasion. If you want people to believe you, make your message easy to process: use simple language, high-quality printing, vivid colors, and memorable rhymes. If you want people to think critically, create cognitive strain: use complex language, difficult fonts, or present information in unfamiliar formats. The level of cognitive ease profoundly shapes whether System 1 or System 2 will dominate decision-making.