Linguistic Concreteness

What it is

Linguistic concreteness is wording that names specific, picturable things in place of general terms. Jochim Hansen and Michaela Wänke reported in 2010 that identical statements were rated as more likely to be true when phrased concretely, and they traced part of the effect to greater perceived vividness.

In effect

In four experiments, concrete wording raised judged truth, and concrete statements were especially persuasive when participants had been primed to think concretely. A headline that names the kind of client, the kind of problem and one result gives a reader more to picture than general terms for ambition. The experiments did not test headlines, so this is an application of the finding and not a result of it.

What it does not say

The finding comes from the study named on this page and describes a pattern in that sample. It does not show that the pattern holds for every person, product or market, and it does not tell a brand what to do on its own. It is one input to a decision, to be weighed with other evidence.

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