Marketing messages become significantly more persuasive when they utilise specific “reversible” words that force sceptics to work harder to disagree, according to new research from the University of California San Diego.
A study by the Rady School of Management, to be published in the Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, identifies a subtle linguistic mechanism that shapes consumers’ confidence in a brand’s claims. The researchers found that the persuasiveness of a message hinges on whether the words used have an easily retrievable opposite.
Mechanism of reversibility
The study explores how people constantly evaluate whether messages are true or false. While agreement is processed similarly regardless of word choice, the research reveals that word selection dramatically alters how people handle disagreement.
When a company frames a message using “reversible” words — those with a clear opposite, such as “intense” versus “mild” or “guilty” versus “innocent” — consumers who disagree must mentally “flip” the claim to its opposite meaning. For example, rejecting “the scent is intense” requires the consumer to formulate the thought “the scent is mild”.
This extra cognitive step of retrieving and substituting the opposite word makes sceptics feel less certain about their opposing belief.
The strategic advantage
In contrast, when marketers use words without clear opposites (such as “prominent” or “romantic”), consumers tend to negate them simply by adding “not” — for example, “not romantic”. The study found that this simpler cognitive process leaves sceptics feeling far more confident in their rejection of the message, rendering the marketing campaign less effective overall.
“For marketers, this creates a powerful advantage: by using easily reversible words in a positive affirmation… companies can maximise certainty among those who accept the claim while minimising certainty among people who reject the message,” said Giulia Maimone, a doctoral student at UC San Diego during the research. “People don’t just decide ‘true’ or ‘false’ — they also form a level of certainty that affects how persuasive a message becomes.”
Real-world application
To confirm these findings outside the laboratory, the researchers conducted a field test using Facebook advertisements in collaboration with a non-profit. The team found that ad language designed to trigger the higher-confidence processing pathway produced a higher click-through rate than language designed to trigger the lower-confidence pathway.
“Language isn’t just how we communicate — it can be a strategic lever,” said On Amir, study coauthor and professor of marketing at the Rady School. “The right wording can help an intended message land more firmly — and make the counter-belief feel less certain.”
