Dilution and Negation of Consumer Information by Antifactual Content: Proposals for Solutions

Following identification and analysis of antifactual content and the tendency of information researchers and regulators to ignore it, this article continues the discussion by presenting proposals to incorporate the concept into research and public policy on the quantity and quality of marketplace information available to consumers. Proposals are offered for information researchers, for regulators and policymakers such as the FTC, for advertisers, and for consumers and consumer advocates. ********** This second of two articles offers proposals for dealing with three types of advertising content called loophole claims. As discussed in the first article, they include (1) puffery, which explicitly is opinion; (2) obvious falsity, which explicitly is fact but presumably recognized as obviously false; and (3) lifestyle claims, which explicitly are fact although about the consumer rather than about the advertised item. All three, then, are explicitly nonfactual about the item and thus noninformative about it. For that reason, apparently, they are ignored in an important body of research conducted on amount and types of information, as well as in the consideration of information by advertising regulators, principally the Federal Trade Commission. This author holds, however, that in considerations of information the loophole claims are not nothing, they are something. The hypothesized connection to information occurs when consumers either see the claims meaning nothing factually about the advertised item, or else see them stating facts by implication about the item. When consumers see the loopholes implying facts that they accept and that are true, the claims are informative. But when consumers accept such implied facts, and those facts are false and material, thus deceptive, the claims are misinformative. And, when they see the claims either implying no facts or implying facts that they reject, the claims are noninformative. In the latter cases the suggestion offered here is that the claims are antifactual, meaning consumers see them as detracting from information. When rejecting such claims as noninformative, i.e., not fact, thus neither true nor false, consumers perceive an ad's body of information to be diluted. When rejecting them as misinformativ e, i.e., factually false, they perceive the ad's information to be negated. Assuming the social value of identifying consumer information and pursuing public policy about it, the purpose of these articles is to note that such value seems significantly reduced by the decisions of information researchers and regulators to recognize only explicitly informational claims. In doing so they ignore too many other claims, including many that are neutral or negative rather than positive as information. The alternative proposed here is that loophole claims, and in fact all claims both explicit and implied that consumers may see as pertinent to assessing information, should be recognized and incorporated into procedures intended to obtain adequate information about information. While the first article discussed the above points in detail, the present article offers specific proposals for strategies and actions to be taken by information researchers, regulators, advertisers, and consumers. PROPOSALS FOR INFORMATION RESEARCHERS While information research has revealed useful knowledge about quantity and quality of information, proposals are offered here for extending such results and making them more valid indicators. The principal underlying recommendation is that research might incorporate the loophole claims and all implied claims to obtain a more complete picture of the information that exists in advertising and other selling messages as consumers see those messages. Research on All Types of Message Content, and on Responses to Them Ideally, research should assure the study of everything consumers might potential y identify as information or that might affect their perception and evaluation of what they identify as information. …