Be Happy Naked: an analysis of a 2004 Evian bottled water advertisement campaign

Introduction

I originally submitted the following article to a competition held on the now defunct blog section of Church of Critical Thinking.

I am reproducing it here for permanent record and academic referencing. Please remember that it is written in a style that is supposed to be fun and informative.

I have cleaned up a few stylistic tics which made me cringe on re-reading, but I have not changed anything of the substance.

The Advert

The text of the advertisement reads as follows:

Headline: Be Happy Naked

Get skin so good you want to show it off.

79% of people who drink an extra litre of evian pure natural mineral water a day notice their skin looking smoother, more hydrated and as a result visibly younger.

Small print: Research undertaken over a period of 6 weeks by people drinking an extra 1 litre of Evian per day in addition to their daily fluid intake.

My article

I noticed the preceding advertisement in today's (Sunday 18 July 2004) Observer newspaper's "Observer Magazine" section on page 26.

Although this advert is not 'explicit' (except, perhaps, in the content) in it's claim, it is reasonably expected that the person viewing the advert will make a causal connection between the drinking of Evian mineral water and an improvement in one's skin quality. This is a perfect example of a 'post hoc ergo prompter hoc' fallacy - a coincidental correlation.

The use of the "79% of people... notice their skin looking smoother (etc.)" is simply an appeal to popularity (an argumentum ad populum). Just because "79% of people" think their skin looked smoother tells us no more than the vanities of those 79% of people. Did they see someone who could tell them whether their skin had objectively improved? A dermatologist or similar medical professional would be able to determine whether or not their skin had improved in an objective manner. Instead, a claim is made about the efficacy of a product based on how people "notice" that their skin is "looking, smoother, more hydrated and as a result visibly younger".

The part about the visible youngness that the skin exudes is also a subjective conclusion. Just because sin is "looking smoother" and "more hydrated" does not necessarily mean that one can make an objective conclusion that it looks "visibly younger", only that those people think it looks younger.

These conclusions are essentially untestable due to their subjective nature. The psychology of body image is a very fickle and odd thing. It is difficult to understand how people see their body - it is certainly not objectively. I don't think it's a huge leap of faith to say that people are not as objective as they could be when evaluating their own body image.

There is also a failure to define what "more hydrated" means.

Methodologically, this hammed up study is also of an extremely poor quality. There is no information in the small print as to whether the people who consumed the litre of Evian a day understood whether they were drinking specifically that brand, or whether they knew the purpose of the study. And what of method? Was there a control group? Was there a group of people who they delivered tap water to? Presumably, there would be a group of people who's perception of body image would increase in six weeks anyway. Also, were any precautions taken to ensure that they didn't slap skin cream on themselves or run off to dermatologists?

The advert also fails to explain why people will find themselves happier and with healthier skin by drinking Evian water than drinking either generic 'Brand X' or water from the tap. Drinking water is accepted by most medical authorities to be beneficial.

The problem is not so much with the advertiser but the audience who will view the advert. As I confidently predicted above, they will make the leap to think that because 79% of people reported that they thought their skin looked "smoother, more hydrated" that the consumption off the water makes skin better. In fact, consumption of this brand of water only changes body image. We do not know whether this is due to a positive benefit of either the water, the marketing of the water, the psychological reactions to testing or being asked about body image - a touchy subject if ever there was one - or simply due to poor methodology.

It is worth noting, though, that the advert appears on the page facing the weekly column of the Barefoot Doctor (p. 63), where he advocates a heady mixture of "Taoist wisdom", acupuncture, tai chi, chi gung and lots of things involving Yin and Yang, meridians and other things which need, as he states quite plainly, "some level of intrinsic faith". (Yes, I can do out-of-context quotation, but his words nail the problem better than mine).

And one need only turn to page 65 to get our dose of astrology. Incidentally, I'm suffering a mixture of "love and hate" and "infatuation and irritation" because "Venus and Mars are marching in step for several weeks" and thus "my condition appears to be ongoing". And how do I get out of this little problem? "negotiation with the other party". "And the infatuation? As the poet said, there ain't no cure for love". Just so you know, I'm a romantically unattached bachelor (Hey ladies! I'm a blogger! And I'm single!) and have been for a while. I suppose though, if I do manage to become romantically attached before next Sunday, all my bases will be covered: love AND hate, infatuation AND irritation! Whatever happens, my horoscope will come true!

I suppose it's not all bad. I did get a picture of a naked woman on a bicycle.

The Reaction

David from Church of Critical Thinking posted this on his site, and after his readers voted, it won the contest. As a reward, I was given a musical prayer clock. You can see an in-situ photograph of this over on my Flickr account.

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Last updated 22/2/06; 8:33:00 pm by Tom Morris. bbtommorris@gmail.com Home Page | Previous | Next