70. People Want What Is Familiar When They’re Sad Or Scared

It’s Friday afternoon and your boss calls you in to say that he’s not happy with your latest project report. This is the project that you repeatedly told him was in trouble and to which you asked that more staff be assigned. You feel all your warnings were ignored. Now he’s telling you that this work will reflect badly on you and that you may even lose your job. On the way home you stop at the grocery store. You are sad and scared. Will you buy the cereal you always buy, or will you try something new?

The Desire for The Familiar is Related to the Fear of Loss

According to research by Marieke de Vries (2010) of Radboud University Nijmegen, in the Netherlands, you will buy the familiar brand. Research shows that people want what is familiar when they are sad or scared. They are willing to try something new and different when they’re in a happy mood and not as sensitive to what is familiar.

This craving for the familiar and preference for familiar brands is probably tied to the basic fear of loss. In my book Neuro Web Design: What Makes Them Click?, I talk about the fear of loss. When people are sad or scared, the old brain and the mid-brain (emotional) are on alert. They have to protect themselves. And a quick way to be safe is to go with what you know. A strong brand is familiar. A strong logo is familiar. So when people are sad or scared, they’ll go for a brand and logo they know.