Teaser ads are advertisements that selectively provide information about a product or, in the case of news shows, about news stories that will be covered (which, in fact, could be told at the time that the teaser is presented but the purpose is to get the viewer to come back after a commercial break to get the answer; a newsreader might say "What new death threat will the U.S. face in the next few days? We'll be right back with that story!"). Some definitions of teaser ads are provided at the following website: http://www.answers.com/topic/teaser-ad
Curiously, Wikipedia doesn't have an entry on teaser ad though the term pops up in a number of entries. There is an entry on "teaser trailers", that is, they are movie trailers that come out long before the movie is even finished and may contain info/scenes that are not present in the movie (I believe that the movie "National Treasure 2" had a trailer that contained scenes that were deleted from the movie). See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teaser_trailer I point this out because I think I have been seeing and increase in the use of teasers on TV and radio, especially on news/information programs. Typically, they are presented before a commercial and seem to be designed to pose a question that can only be answered by staying tuned until after the commercial. This seems like a wasteful use of airtime to me and perhaps unethical if really important informtion will be provided. This has gotten me to thinking about how this practice violates Grice's conversation maxims: http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/dravling/grice.html |Grice's Maxims | (1) The maxim of quantity, where one tries to be as informative as |one possibly can, and gives as much information as is needed, and no more. | |(2) The maxim of quality, where one tries to be truthful, and does not give |information that is false or that is not supported by evidence. | |(3) The maxim of relation, where one tries to be relevant, and says things |that are pertinent to the discussion. | |(4) The maxim of manner, when one tries to be as clear, as brief, and as |orderly as one can in what one says, and where one avoids obscurity and |ambiguity. | |As the maxims stand, there may be an overlap, as regards the length of what |one says, between the maxims of quantity and manner; this overlap can be |explained (partially if not entirely) by thinking of the maxim of quantity (artificial |though this approach may be) in terms of units of information. In other words, |if the listener needs, let us say, five units of information from the speaker, but |gets less, or more than the expected number, then the speaker is breaking the |maxim of quantity. However, if the speaker gives the five required units of |information, but is either too curt or long-winded in conveying them to the |listener, then the maxim of manner is broken. The dividing line however, may |be rather thin or unclear, and there are times when we may say that both the |maxims of quantity and quality are broken by the same factors. For more on the maxims, see the Wikipedia entry (standard disclaimers): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gricean_maxims Additional background on Grice is available at the Stanforld Encyclopedia of Philosophy: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/grice/ I was wondering if (a) anyone else has thought along these lines and (b) whether any research as been conducted on people's reactions to teaser ads and whether their reactions reflect violations of Grice's maxims. Just curious. -Mike Palij New York University [email protected] --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([email protected])
